Raising the bar to ultradisciplinary collaborations in management of chronic thromboembolic pulmonary hypertension.

Chronic thromboembolic pulmonary hypertension is an underdiagnosed and potentially fatal subgroup of pulmonary hypertension, if left untreated. Clinical signs include exertional dyspnea and non-specific symptoms. Diagnosis requires multimodality imaging and heart catheterization. Pulmonary endarterectomy, an open heart surgery, is the gold standard treatment of choice in selected patients in specialized centers. Targeted medical therapy and balloon pulmonary angioplasty can be effective in high-risk patients with significant comorbidities, distal pulmonary vascular obstructions, or recurrent/persistent pulmonary hypertension after pulmonary endarterectomy. Currently, there is a limited number of data regarding novel coronavirus-2019 infection in patients with chronic thromboembolic pulmonary hypertension and the changing spectrum of the disease during the pandemic. Challenging times during this outbreak due to healthcare crisis and relatively higher case-fatality rates require convergence; that is an ultradisciplinary collaboration, which crosses disciplinary and sectorial boundaries to develop integrated knowledge and new paradigms. Management strategies for the "new normal" such as virtual care, preparedness for further threats, redesigned standards and working conditions, reevaluation of specific recommendations, and online collaborations for optimal decisions for chronic thromboembolic pulmonary hypertension patients may change the poor outcomes.

Development and validation of clinical prediction model to estimate the probability of death in hospitalized patients with COVID-19: Insights from a nationwide database.

In the current study, we aimed to develop and validate a model, based on our nationwide centralized coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) database for predicting death. We conducted an observational study (CORONATION-TR registry). All patients hospitalized with COVID-19 in Turkey between March 11 and June 22, 2020 were included. We developed the model and validated both temporal and geographical models. Model performances were assessed by area under the curve-receiver operating characteristic (AUC-ROC or c-index), R2 , and calibration plots. The study population comprised a total of 60,980 hospitalized COVID-19 patients. Of these patients, 7688 (13%) were transferred to intensive care unit, 4867 patients (8.0%) required mechanical ventilation, and 2682 patients (4.0%) died. Advanced age, increased levels of lactate dehydrogenase, C-reactive protein, neutrophil-lymphocyte ratio, creatinine, albumine, and D-dimer levels, and pneumonia on computed tomography, diabetes mellitus, and heart failure status at admission were found to be the strongest predictors of death at 30 days in the multivariable logistic regression model (area under the curve-receiver operating characteristic = 0.942; 95% confidence interval: 0.939-0.945; R2 = .457). There were also favorable temporal and geographic validations. We developed and validated the prediction model to identify in-hospital deaths in all hospitalized COVID-19 patients. Our model achieved reasonable performances in both temporal and geographic validations.

The prognostic role of cardiac troponin in hospitalized COVID-19 patients.

BACKGROUND AND AIMS: Myocardial injury defined by elevation of cardiac troponins (cTn) in the course of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic has been reported, though not fully characterized yet. Using the Turkish nationwide centralized COVID-19 database, we sought to determine whether cTn measured within 24 h of admission may help identify 30-day all-cause mortality in hospitalized patients. METHODS: This retrospective cohort study was conducted at all hospitals in Turkey between March 11, 2020, and June 22, 2020. All hospitalized COVID-19 patients (≥18 years) who had cTn measurements within 24 h of admission were included. The primary outcome was 30-day all-cause mortality. RESULTS: A total of 14,855 COVID-19 patients (median age 49 years and 54% male) from 81 provinces of Turkey were included. Of these, 2020 patients (13.6%) were transferred to intensive care unit, 1165 patients (7.8%) needed mechanical ventilation, and 882 patients (5.9%) died during hospitalization. The prevalence of cTn positivity was 6.9% (n = 1027) in the hospitalized patients. cTn positivity was 5% in those patients alive at 30-day, and 44% in those who died. In multivariable Cox proportional hazard regression model, age, lactate dehydrogenase, and cTn were the strongest predictors of 30-day mortality, irrespective of cTn definition as a continuous, ordinal variable, or dichotomic variables. CONCLUSIONS: A single measurement of cTn at admission in patients with COVID-19 is associated with 30-day all-cause mortality and may have an important prognostic role for optimizing risk stratification.

Cover Image, Volume 93, Number 5, May 2021

The cover image is based on the Research Article Development and validation of clinical prediction model to estimate the probability of death in hospitalized patients with COVID-19: Insights from a nationwide database by Ibrahim Halil Tanbo?a et al., https://doi.org/10.1002/jmv.26844.

Incidence of symptomatic venous thromboembolism following hospitalization for coronavirus disease 2019: Prospective results from a multi-center study.

BACKGROUND: Thrombosis and pulmonary embolism appear to be major causes of mortality in hospitalized coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) patients. However, few studies have focused on the incidence of venous thromboembolism (VTE) after hospitalization for COVID-19. METHODS: In this multi-center study, we followed 1529 COVID-19 patients for at least 45 days after hospital discharge, who underwent routine telephone follow-up. In case of signs or symptoms of pulmonary embolism (PE) or deep vein thrombosis (DVT), they were invited for an in-hospital visit with a pulmonologist. The primary outcome was symptomatic VTE within 45 days of hospital discharge. RESULTS: Of 1529 COVID-19 patients discharged from hospital, a total of 228 (14.9%) reported potential signs or symptoms of PE or DVT and were seen for an in-hospital visit. Of these, 13 and 12 received Doppler ultrasounds or pulmonary CT angiography, respectively, of whom only one patient was diagnosed with symptomatic PE. Of 51 (3.3%) patients who died after discharge, two deaths were attributed to VTE corresponding to a 45-day cumulative rate of symptomatic VTE of 0.2% (95%CI 0.1%-0.6%; n = 3). There was no evidence of acute respiratory distress syndrome (ARDS) in these patients. Other deaths after hospital discharge included myocardial infarction (n = 13), heart failure (n = 9), and stroke (n = 9). CONCLUSIONS: We did not observe a high rate of symptomatic VTE in COVID-19 patients after hospital discharge. Routine extended thromboprophylaxis after hospitalization for COVID-19 may not have a net clinical benefit. Randomized trials may be warranted.