Clinical manifestations of hospitalized COVID-19 patients in Bangladesh: a 14-day observational study

Shaha, M.; Islam, M. A.; Huq, F.; Roy, B.; Kabir, A.; Salimullah, M.; Mahtab, M. A.; Akbar, S. M. F.

Objectives: Severe acute respiratory coronavirus-2 (SARS-CoV-2) is currently a significant public health concern and causing a pandemic in the world. Despite of immense attention to the coronavirus disease-2019 (COVID-19), very little attention has been given to the kinetics of disease progression in infected patients. Therefore, in this study, we present a 14-day clinical observation of hospital-admitted COVID-19 patients. Methods: After recording the demography of 42 COVID-19 patients on day 1, we observed the clinical progression for 14 days by investigating the hematological and biochemical responses of patients blood and serum, respectively. Results: Approximately 62% of the hospital-admitted COVID-19 patients presented cough, followed by fever (approximately 52%). The top comorbidities of these patients were hypertension (30%) and diabetes mellitus (19%). The average blood hemoglobin level was slightly low among the patients in early days of infection and went up to the normal level on the latter days. A substantial increase in the level of ALT/SGPT (up to 106 units/L; SEM: 12.64) and AST/SGOT (up to 64.35 units/L; SEM: 5.013) in COVID-19 patients was observed, which may suggest that infection with CoV-2019 is associated with the functionality of other organs of COVID-19 patients. Conclusion: This 14-day observational study may help clinicians to decide the choice of treatment of COVID-19 patients.