Overall decrease in SARS-CoV-2 viral load and reduction in clinical burden: the experience of a hospital in northern Italy.
Clin Microbiol Infect
; 27(1): 131.e1-131.e3, 2021 Jan.
Article
en En
| MEDLINE
| ID: mdl-33059091
ABSTRACT
OBJECTIVES:
In Italy the burden of patients with coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) gradually decreased from March to the end of May. In this work we aimed to evaluate a possible association between the severity of clinical manifestations and viral load over time during the epidemiological transition from high-to low-transmission settings.METHODS:
We reviewed the cases of COVID-19 diagnosed at the emergency room of our hospital, retrieving the proportion of patients admitted to the intensive care unit. A raw estimation of the viral load was done evaluating the Ct (cycle threshold) trend obtained from our diagnostic reverse transcriptase real-time PCR test.RESULTS:
The proportion of patients requiring intensive care significantly decreased from 6.7% (19/281) in March to 1.1% (1/86) in April, and to none in May (Fisher's test p 0.0067). As for viral load, we observed a trend of Ct increasing from a median value of 24 (IQR 19-29) to 34 (IQR 29-37) between March and May, with a statistically significant difference between March and April (pairwise Wilcoxon test with stepdown Bonferroni adjustment for multiple testing, p 0.0003).CONCLUSIONS:
We observed a reduction over time in the proportion of patients with COVID-19 requiring intensive care, along with decreasing median values of viral load. As the epidemiological context changes from high-to low-transmission settings, people are presumably exposed to a lower viral load which has been previously associated with less severe clinical manifestations.Palabras clave
Texto completo:
1
Colección:
01-internacional
Base de datos:
MEDLINE
Contexto en salud:
1_ASSA2030
/
2_ODS3
/
4_TD
Problema de salud:
1_doencas_nao_transmissiveis
/
2_muertes_prematuras_enfermedades_notrasmisibles
/
4_pneumonia
Asunto principal:
Pandemias
/
SARS-CoV-2
/
COVID-19
Tipo de estudio:
Diagnostic_studies
Límite:
Aged
/
Aged80
/
Female
/
Humans
/
Male
/
Middle aged
País/Región como asunto:
Europa
Idioma:
En
Revista:
Clin Microbiol Infect
Asunto de la revista:
DOENCAS TRANSMISSIVEIS
/
MICROBIOLOGIA
Año:
2021
Tipo del documento:
Article
País de afiliación:
Italia