• Noel Roig-Marín and Pablo Roig-Rico.
• Campus de San Juan de Alicante, Universidad Miguel Hernández, Alicante, Spain.
• Postgrad Med. 2023 Apr 1; 135 (3): 265272265-272.

IntroductionGround-glass opacity is commonly seen on radiographic imaging tests of patients admitted for COVID-19. The main objective of this study is to determine if the presence of ground-glass opacity on chest X-rays carried out at the Emergency Department correlates with significantly higher mortality. A secondary objective is to clarify which characteristics are associated with those patients who presented ground-glass opacity.MethodsData were obtained from our 2020 hospital admission records. Consequently, this is a retrospective cohort study. Our cohort consists of 300 admissions from a group of elderly with a mean age of 81.6. There were 49.3% women (148/300) and 50.7% men (152/300).ResultsThe presence of ground-glass opacity on chest X-rays is a risk factor for in-hospital mortality (RR = 1.6), heart failure (RR = 4.3), respiratory failure (RR = 1.5), acute kidney injury (RR = 1.3) and ICU admission (RR = 2.7).ConclusionBased on these results, the variable 'finding ground-glass opacity on chest X-rays carried out at the Emergency Department' should be assessed for inclusion in the different calculators that estimate the prognosis/mortality rate of patients admitted for COVID-19.

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