Thread by @FintanYTWalsh

Analysis of #Covid19 patients in the Jiangsu Province, on the central-east coast of China. This is just a good insight into the #coronavirus patient experience from a clinical point of view.

Study was carried out by 16 institutions across the region.

Sample: 60 severely ill Covid-19 patients between January 23 and February 24

One of the main symptoms for severeness was high respiratory rate of more than 30 breaths per minute.

Early intervention included resting support, antiviral therapy, early oxygen therapy.

The 60 patients accounted for less than 10% of 631 cases across 12 hospitals in the region.

The youngest patient was 26 and the oldest was 97. The median age of 57, and 35 of the 60 were male.

The most common symptoms were fever (80%) and dry cough (51.7%)

A total of 31 patients had pre-existing conditions, which is just 51%.

There were also some non-specific symptoms, such as diarrhoea (6.7%), vomiting (3.3%) and chest pain (1.7%). The last figure might surprise some people. There was one pregnant patient.

30 patients had normal white blood cell counts, and 27 had decreased counts. 38 had lymphopenia — abnormally low lymphocytes (small white blood cells), essential for the immune system.

During treatment, 16 developed respiratory failure, and nine developed condition where fluid builds up in the air sacs in the lungs.

All patients received antiviral therapy.

Respiratory treatment included non-invasive mechanical ventilation or/and high-flow nasal tubes.

As of February 23, no patients had died, and the condition of 50 patients massively improved. Just two patients were discharged and eight remained in serious condition.

The key finding was that respiratory/lung treatment was beneficial to treating severe conditions.

The study was not peer-reviewed, but considerable data and patient experience were collated to produce this fast track report
papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cf…