Clinical characteristic and epidemiological features of SARS CoV-2 disease patients from a COVID-19 designated hospital in New Delhi

Abstract

Severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS CoV-2) infection is rapidly evolving as a serious global pandemic. The present study describes the clinical characteristics of SARS CoV-2 infection patients. The samples were subjected to reverse-transcription polymerase chain reaction or Rapid Antigen test for diagnosis of SARS CoV-2. A cohort of 3745 patients with confirmed diagnosis of SARS CoV-2 infection in a tertiary care center in New Delhi, India were included in this study. Data were collected from offline and online medical records over a period of 6 months. Amongst 3745 SARS CoV-2 infected patients, 2245 (60%) were symptomatic and 1500 (40%) were asymptomatic. Most common presenting symptom was cough (49.3%) followed febrile episodes (47.1%), breathlessness (42.7%), and sore throat (35.1%). Cough along with breathlessness (24.1) was the most common combination of symptoms followed by fever with cough (22.7). The most common comorbidity found among symptomatic group was diabetes (42.5%) followed by hypertension (21.4%) and chronic kidney disease (18%). Comorbidities like diabetes mellitus, chronic diseases of lungs, heart, and kidneys were found to be common in symptomatic group and this was found to be statistically significant (p < .05). COVID-19 is an evolving disease and data from our study help in understanding the clinic-epidemiological profile of patients.

Keywords: COVID‐19; SARS‐CoV‐2; coronavirus disease.