Short-term celecoxib (celebrex) adjuvant therapy: a clinical trial study on COVID-19 patients.

BACKGROUND: It is known that severe acute respiratory coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) is the viral strain responsible for the recent coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic. Current documents have demonstrated that the virus causes a PGE2 storm in a substantial proportion of patients via upregulating cyclooxygenase-2 (COX-2) and downregulating prostaglandin E2 (PGE2)-degrading enzymes within the host cell. AIM: Herein, we aimed to study how short-term treatment with celecoxib (Celebrex), a selective COX-2 inhibitor, affects demographic features, early symptoms, O2 saturation, and hematological indices of cases with COVID-19. METHODS: A total of 67 confirmed COVID-19 cases with a mild or moderate disease, who had been referred to an institutional hospital in south-eastern Iran from October 2020 to September 2021, were enrolled. Demographic characteristics, symptoms, and hematological indices of the patients were recorded within different time periods. One-way ANOVA or Kruskal-Wallis tests were used to determine differences between data sets based on normal data distribution. RESULTS: O2 saturation was statistically different between the control group and patients receiving celecoxib (p = 0.039). There was no marked difference between the groups in terms of the symptoms they experienced (p > 0.05). On the first days following Celebrex therapy, analysis of complete blood counts showed that white blood cell (WBC) counts were markedly lower in patients treated with a high dose of celecoxib (0.4 g/day) than in controls (p = 0.026). However, mean lymphocyte levels in patients receiving a high dose of celecoxib (0.4 g/day) were markedly higher than in patients receiving celecoxib with half of the dose (0.2 g/day) for one week or the untreated subjects (p = 0.004). Changes in platelet count also followed the WBC alteration pattern. CONCLUSION: Celecoxib is a relatively safe, inexpensive, and widely available drug with non-steroidal anti-inflammatory properties. The therapeutic efficacy of celecoxib depends on the administrated dose. Celecoxib might improve disease-free survival in patients with COVID-19.

Spontaneous Multiple Haematomas in a Patient with Severe COVID-19 Fully Recovered with a Conservative Approach.

A significant number of hospitalized patients with COVID-19 are prone to thromboembolic events including deep vein thrombosis, pulmonary embolism, cerebrovascular accident, and myocardial infarction. However, some COVID-19 patients have a higher risk of bleeding that is associated with an increased risk of mortality. We report a 71-year-old woman who was a confirmed case of COVID-19 admitted for pulmonary involvement and complicated acute renal failure. During hospitalization, she suffered from a sudden onset of severe pain in the lower left abdomen as well as a sudden drop in blood pressure and hemoglobin. Haematomas in the left rectus and obturator internus muscle were observed in abdominal and pelvic computed tomography scan. Signs of haemorrhage were also seen in the anterolateral aspect of the bladder with extension to the paracolic, subdiaphragmatic, perihepatic and, perisplenic spaces. The patient was totally recovered by a conservative approach. Bleeding tendency could be a serious complication, especially, in COVID-19 patients with complicated renal failure that receive heparin prophylaxis.