The study has found that diabetic COVID-19 patients are least likely to survive after getting infected.
A French CORONADO study, published in the government journal Clinical Trials has suggested that one in five hospitalised COVID-19 patient with diabetes as a co-morbidity is likely to die within 28 days after getting infected. The research had begun during the first wave of the pandemic in early 2020.
The study’s preliminary investigation had found that 10.6 per cent of patients with type 2 diabetes and Covid-19 and 5.6 per cent of those with type 1 diabetes and Covid-19 died within a week after hospitalisation.
Further investigation involving 2796 COVID-19 patients with diabetes who were hospitalised at 68 institutions across France between March 10 and April 10, 2020, revealed that the primary outcome was tracheal intubation and/or death. Tracheal intubation involves a procedure that places a flexible plastic tube into the windpipe (trachea) to maintain an open airway or to serve as a conduit through which to administer certain drugs.
The study found that after 28 days, 577 patients (20.6 per cent) had died and 1404 (50.2 per cent) had been discharged. The median duration of hospital stay was 9 days.
Lead author Mathieu Wargny, MD, L’Institut du Thorax, INSERM, CNRS, University Hospital of Nantes said that “Researchers had also identified the principal prognostic risk factors, both negative and positive. “
Among the risk factors that led to negative outcomes, advancing age was the most important followed by a history of microvascular complications, particularly kidney or eye damage. Also, inflammatory markers like white blood cell count, raised C-reactive protein, and elevated aspartate transaminase led to poorer outcomes.
Among the positive risk factors, researchers identified routine treatment with metformin and history of Covid-19 symptoms before hospitalisation.
