Open AccessFeatures of patients that died for COVID-19 in a hospital in the south of Mexico: A observational cohort study
Author(s) -
Jesús Arturo Ruíz-Quiñonez,
Crystell Guadalupe Guzmán-Priego,
Germán Alberto Nolasco-Rosales,
Carlos Alfonso TovillaZárate,
Oscar Israel Flores-Barrientos,
Víctor Narváez-Osorio,
Guadalupe del Carmen BaezaFlores,
Thelma Beatriz GonzálezCastro,
Carlos Ramón López-Brito,
Carlos Alberto Denis-García,
A. PérezGarcía,
Isela Esther JuárezRojop
Publication year - 2021
Publication title -
plos one
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.99
H-Index - 332
ISSN - 1932-6203
DOI - 10.1371/journal.pone.0245394
Subject(s) - medicine , hydroxychloroquine , diabetes mellitus , observational study , comorbidity , cohort , azithromycin , pediatrics , obesity , medical record , covid-19 , disease , infectious disease (medical specialty) , microbiology and biotechnology , biology , endocrinology , antibiotics
Background Due to the wide spread of SARS-CoV2 around the world, the risk of death in individuals with metabolic comorbidities has dangerously increased. Mexico has a high number of infected individuals and deaths by COVID-19 as well as an important burden of metabolic diseases; nevertheless, reports about features of Mexican individuals with COVID-19 are scarce. The aim of this study was to evaluate demographic features, clinical characteristics and the pharmacological treatment of individuals who died by COVID-19 in the south of Mexico. Methods We performed an observational study including the information of 185 deceased individuals with confirmed diagnoses of COVID-19. Data were retrieved from medical records. Categorical data were expressed as proportions (%) and numerical data were expressed as mean ± standard deviation. Comorbidities and overlapping symptoms were plotted as Venn diagrams. Drug clusters were plotted as dendrograms. Results The mean age was 59.53 years. There was a male predominance (60.1%). The mean hospital stay was 4.75 ± 4.43 days. The most frequent symptoms were dyspnea (88.77%), fever (71.42%) and dry cough (64.28%). Present comorbidities included diabetes (60.63%), hypertension (59.57%) and obesity (43.61%). The main drugs used for treating COVID-19 were azithromycin (60.6%), hydroxychloroquine (53.0%) and oseltamivir (27.3%). Conclusions Mexican individuals who died of COVID-19 had shorter hospital stays, higher frequency of shortness of breath, and higher prevalence of diabetes than individuals from other countries. Also, there was a high frequency of off-label use of drugs for their treatment.