Comorbid older patients faced bigger risk of complications in Covid: Study

PANAJI: A GMC study has confirmed the opinion of medical experts that older patients with comorbidities were at higher risk of complications and death from Covid infection during the first two waves of the Covid-19 pandemic.
Data of 100 Covid patients, comprising mild (5%), moderate (6%) and severe (34%), among others, was examined for comorbid conditions, disease severity, and clinical outcomes.
Medical records of patients admitted in GMC between November 23, 2020, and December 23, 2020, were examined by doctors Dhanya Jose, Mahendra M Pauskar, Yallaling Sannasanni, Jagadish Cacodkar and Anar Khandepar for the study titled, ‘Comorbidities and clinical outcomes of patients with Covid-19 in the tertiary care centre at Goa: A prospective observational study’.
They concluded that older men with underlying hypertension, diabetes, cardiovascular and cerebrovascular conditions ran a higher risk for severe clinical form. Fever, cough, and dyspnea were the common signs on admission.
The laboratory parameters showed a significant increase in cardiovascular resuscitation (CPR), ferritin, lactate dehydrogenase (LDH), procalcitonin, an erythrocyte sedimentation rate (ESR), and d-dimer in the case of SARS-CoV-2 infection.
The study also identified diabetes (66%) as the common comorbidity among the sample study, followed by hypertension (57%) and cardiovascular and cerebrovascular conditions was noted in 27% of the patients.
Since June 2020 till date, Goa has recorded 4014 Covid deaths. Health services data shows that most of the deceased had diabetes or hypertension, or both, in many cases. An 85-year-old man who died after being infected with Covid-19, on June 22, 2020, the state’s first Covid mortality, had acute respiratory distress syndrome (ARDS). Some had more than two health conditions, such as chronic kidney disease, hypertension, diabetes, cancers, heart disease, Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary disease (COPD). The number of people who suffered from alcoholic liver cirrhosis and died after being infected with Covid was also high.
Though the health services data on Covid deaths has records of the underlying health conditions of most deceased, it does not have records of those who were brought dead to hospital. Several such deaths — brought dead — were registered during the peaks of the first two waves of the pandemic. Some dead were picked up from the streets, and their whereabouts were never known.
It also could not gather data on those who were confirmed to have died of Covid much later. The number of such deaths could be over 200. Families submitted Covid death certificates after the government announced compensation to the families of the deceased.
Some Covid deaths, however, were added late due to delays on the part of private hospitals in submitting data to the health services.