Unchanged Characteristics and Survival among Critically Ill COVID-19 Patients during First, Second, and Third Waves: A Prospective Observational Cohort.

BACKGROUND: This study was carried out to compare characteristics and outcomes in patients with acute respiratory failure related to COVID-19 during first, second, and third waves. METHODS: We included consecutive adults admitted to the intensive care unit between March 2020 and July 2021. We compared three groups defined by the epidemic intake phase: waves 1 (W1), 2 (W2), and 3 (W3). RESULTS: We included 289 patients. Two hundred and eight (72%) patients were men with a median age of 63 years (IQR: 54-72), of whom 68 (23.6%) died in hospital. High-flow nasal oxygen (HFNO) was inversely associated with the need for invasive mechanical ventilation (MV) in multivariate analysis (p = 0.003) but not dexamethasone (p = 0.25). The day-90 mortality rate did not vary from W1 (27.4%) to W2 (23.9%) and W3 (22%), p = 0.67. By multivariate analysis, older age (odds ratio [OR]: 0.94/year, p < 0.001), immunodeficiency (OR: 0.33, p = 0.04), acute kidney injury (OR: 0.26, p < 0.001), and invasive MV (OR: 0.13, p < 0.001) were inversely associated with higher day-90 survival as opposed to the use of intermediate heparin thromboprophylaxis dose (OR: 3.21, p = 0.006). HFNO use and dexamethasone were not associated with higher day-90 survival (p = 0.24 and p = 0.56, respectively). CONCLUSIONS: In patients with acute respiratory failure due to COVID-19, survival did not change between first, second, and third waves while the use of invasive MV decreased. HFNO or intravenous steroids were not associated with better outcomes, whereas the use of intermediate dose of heparin for thromboprophylaxis was associated with higher day-90 survival. Larger multicentric studies are needed to confirm our findings.

Postextubation Stridor in Severe COVID-19.

BACKGROUND: During the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic, 60-80% of patients admitted to ICU require mechanical ventilation for respiratory distress. We aimed to compare the frequency of postextubation stridor (PES) and to explore risk factors in COVID-19 subjects compared to those without COVID-19. METHODS: We performed an observational retrospective study on subjects admitted for severe COVID-19 requiring mechanical ventilation > 48 h during the first and second waves in 2020 and compared these subjects to historical controls without COVID-19 who received mechanical ventilation > 48 h between 2016-2019. The primary outcome was the frequency of PES, defined as audible stridor within 2 h following extubation. RESULTS: Of the 134 subjects admitted with severe COVID-19 requiring mechanical ventilation, 96 were extubated and included and compared to 211 controls. The frequency of PES was 22.9% in the COVID-19 subjects and 3.8% in the controls (P < .001). Factors independently associated with PES were having COVID-19 (odds ratio 3.72, [95% CI 1.24-12.14], P = .02), female sex (odds ratio 5.77 [95% CI 2.30-15.64], P < .001), and tube mobilization or re-intubation or prone positioning (odds ratio 3.01 [95% CI 1.04-9.44], P = .047) after adjustment on Simplified Acute Physiology Score II expanded). During the first wave, PES was significantly more common in subjects with a positive SARS-CoV-2 RT-PCR test on tracheal samples on the day of extubation (73.3% vs 24.3%, P = .018). CONCLUSIONS: PES affected nearly one-quarter of subjects with COVID-19, a proportion significantly higher than that seen in controls. Independent risk factors for PES were COVID-19, female sex, and tube mobilization or re-intubation or prone positioning. PES was associated with persistent viral shedding at the time of extubation.

Association of ventilator type with hospital mortality in critically ill patients with SARS-CoV2 infection: a prospective study.

BACKGROUND: To evaluate the association between ventilator type and hospital mortality in patients with acute respiratory distress syndrome (ARDS) related to COVID-19 (SARS-CoV2 infection), a single-center prospective observational study in France. RESULTS: We prospectively included consecutive adults admitted to the intensive care unit (ICU) of a university-affiliated tertiary hospital for ARDS related to proven COVID-19, between March 2020 and July 2021. All patients were intubated. We compared two patient groups defined by whether an ICU ventilator or a less sophisticated ventilator such as a sophisticated turbine-based transport ventilator was used. Kaplan-Meier survival curves were plotted. Cox multivariate regression was performed to identify associations between patient characteristics and hospital mortality. We included 189 patients (140 [74.1%] men) with a median age of 65 years [IQR, 55-73], of whom 61 (32.3%) died before hospital discharge. By multivariate analysis, factors associated with in-hospital mortality were age ≥ 70 years (HR, 2.11; 95% CI, 1.24-3.59; P = 0.006), immunodeficiency (HR, 2.43; 95% CI, 1.16-5.09; P = 0.02) and serum creatinine ≥ 100 µmol/L (HR, 3.01; 95% CI, 1.77-5.10; P < 0.001) but not ventilator type. As compared to conventional ICU (equipped with ICU and anesthesiology ventilators), management in transient ICU (equipped with non-ICU turbine-based ventilators) was associated neither with a longer duration of invasive mechanical ventilation (18 [IQR, 11-32] vs. 21 [13-37] days, respectively; P = 0.39) nor with a longer ICU stay (24 [IQR, 14-40] vs. 27 [15-44] days, respectively; P = 0.44). CONCLUSIONS: In ventilated patients with ARDS due to COVID-19, management in transient ICU equipped with non-ICU sophisticated turbine-based ventilators was not associated with worse outcomes compared to standard ICU, equipped with ICU ventilators. Although our study design is not powered to demonstrate any difference in outcome, our results after adjustment do not suggest any signal of harm when using these transport type ventilators as an alternative to ICU ventilators during COVID-19 surge.

Characteristics and prognosis of bloodstream infection in patients with COVID-19 admitted in the ICU: an ancillary study of the COVID-ICU study.

BACKGROUND: Patients infected with the severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-COV 2) and requiring intensive care unit (ICU) have a high incidence of hospital-acquired infections; however, data regarding hospital acquired bloodstream infections (BSI) are scarce. We aimed to investigate risk factors and outcome of BSI in critically ill coronavirus infectious disease-19 (COVID-19) patients. PATIENTS AND METHODS: We performed an ancillary analysis of a multicenter prospective international cohort study (COVID-ICU study) that included 4010 COVID-19 ICU patients. For the present analysis, only those with data regarding primary outcome (death within 90 days from admission) or BSI status were included. Risk factors for BSI were analyzed using Fine and Gray competing risk model. Then, for outcome comparison, 537 BSI-patients were matched with 537 controls using propensity score matching. RESULTS: Among 4010 included patients, 780 (19.5%) acquired a total of 1066 BSI (10.3 BSI per 1000 patients days at risk) of whom 92% were acquired in the ICU. Higher SAPS II, male gender, longer time from hospital to ICU admission and antiviral drug before admission were independently associated with an increased risk of BSI, and interestingly, this risk decreased over time. BSI was independently associated with a shorter time to death in the overall population (adjusted hazard ratio (aHR) 1.28, 95% CI 1.05-1.56) and, in the propensity score matched data set, patients with BSI had a higher mortality rate (39% vs 33% p = 0.036). BSI accounted for 3.6% of the death of the overall population. CONCLUSION: COVID-19 ICU patients have a high risk of BSI, especially early after ICU admission, risk that increases with severity but not with corticosteroids use. BSI is associated with an increased mortality rate.

Invasive Aspergillosis associated with Covid-19: A word of caution.

INTRODUCTION: Invasive pulmonary aspergillosis is a well-known complication of acute respiratory distress syndrome, the most serious manifestation of COVID-19. Four recent studies have reported its incidence among ICU COVID-19 patients. However, they do not share the same case definition, and have provided conflicting results. In this paper we have aimed at reported the incidence of invasive pulmonary aspergillosis for COVID-19 patients in our ICU, and at comparing the different definitions in order to assess their respective relevance. METHODS: Retrospective cohort study of critically ill patients with severe COVID-19 requiring ICU management between 1st March and 30th April 2020. RESULTS: Our results showed significantly lower incidence of invasive pulmonary aspergillosis (1.8%;1/53), compared to three out of four previous studies, and wide variation in the numbers of cases with regard to the different definitions. CONCLUSION: Large-scale studies are needed for a better definition and a more accurate estimation of invasive pulmonary aspergillosis coinfection during COVID-19.

Rapid screening of COVID-19 patients using white blood cell scattergrams, a study on 381 patients.

Complementary tools are warranted to increase the sensitivity of the initial testing for COVID-19. We identified a specific 'sandglass' aspect on the white blood cell scattergram of COVID-19 patients reflecting the presence of circulating plasmacytoid lymphocytes. Patients were dichotomized as COVID-19-positive or -negative based on reverse transcriptase polymerase chain reaction (RT-PCR) and chest computed tomography (CT) scan results. Sensitivity and specificity of the 'sandglass' aspect were 85·9% and 83·5% respectively. The positive predictive value was 94·3%. Our findings provide a non-invasive and simple tool to quickly categorize symptomatic patients as either COVID-19-probable or -improbable especially when RT-PCR and/or chest CT are not rapidly available.