ABSTRACT
BackgroundSevere Corona virus disease (COVID-19) is associated with high mortality. Although single centre intensive care units (ICU) have reported clinical characteristics and outcomes, no large scale multicentric study from India has been published. The present retrospective, multi-centre study was aimed to describe the predictors and outcomes of COVID-19 patients requiring ICU admission from COVID-19 Registry of Indian council of Medical Research (ICMR), India.MethodsProspectively collected data from multiple participating institutions was entered in the electronic National Clinical Registry of COVID 19. We enrolled patients aged>18 years with COVID-19 pneumonia requiring ICU admission between March 2020 and August 2021. Exclusion criteria were negative RT PCR, death within 24 hours of ICU admission, or patients with incomplete data in the registry Their demographic characteristics, laboratory variables, ICU severity indices, treatment strategies and outcomes were analysed.ResultsA total of 5865 patients, with mean age 56±15 years, with 3840/5865 (65.4%) men, were enrolled in the ICMR registry.. Overall mortality was 2535/5865 (43.5%). Non-survivors were older than survivors (58.2±15.4 years vs 53.6 ±14.7 years; P=0.001). Non-survivors had multiple comorbidities (n=1951, 52.9%) with hypertension (47.2%) and diabetes (45.6%) being the most common, higher creatinine (1.6 ± P=0.001, high D-dimer (1.56 vs 1.37, P=0.001), higher CT severity index (16.8±5.2 vs 13.5 ±5.47 ) compared to survivors. Non survivors had longer hospital and ICU stay (P=0.001). On multivariate regression analysis, high NLR (HR 1.017, 95% CI 1.005- 1.029, P=0.001), high CRP (HR 1.008, 95% CI 1.006- 1.010, P=0.001), high D dimer ((HR 1.089, 95% CI 1.065- 1.113, P=0.001) were associated with mechanical ventilation while younger age, (HR 0.974, CI 0.965-0.983, p=0.001), high D dimer (HR-1.014, CI 1.001-1.027, P=0.035) and use of prophylactic LMWH (HR 0.647, CI 0.527-0.794, p=0.001) were independently associated with mortality. ConclusionIn this large retrospective study of 5865 critically ill COVID 19 patients admitted to ICU, overall mortality was 2535/5865 (43.5%). Age, high D dimer, CT Severity score and use of prophylactic LMWH were independently associated with mortality.
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COVID-19ABSTRACT
The sudden spread of COVID-19 across the globe during 2020 severely impacted efficient use of inputs for production in all the sectors in most of the developing countries including India. This paper tries to evaluate technical efficiency of paddy producers by applying the model of stochastic frontier analysis (SFA) under time invariant fixed effect application. To measure the level of technical inefficiency of farmers with family and hired labour with the help of primary data collected from 200 farmers in a field survey in the state of Haryana. Maximum likelihood estimator (MLE) was deployed to estimate the model of production under the assumption of Cobb-Douglas model of production function with stochastic frontier analysis for the variables affecting the technical efficiency. Results show that the important variables that impact the technical efficiency are the cost of labour, seed, fertilizers, machine labour and irrigation charges. Average technical efficiency of the surveyed paddy farmers that used both family and hired labour are 0.73 (73 per cent) and 0.69 (69 per cent) during COVID-19 and before Covid-19 respectively. Farmers have enhanced their level of technical efficiency during COVID-19 by optimally utilizing family labour. This shows that the small agricultural land holders can reduce the level of input requirement by 41 percent for giving the same level of output if their cultivation practices are technically more efficient.
ABSTRACT
Background & Aims: A procoagulant state with pulmonary micro-thrombosis has been described in COVID-19, which contributes to pathophysiology of respiratory failure along with diffuse alveolar damage. Cytokine storm and systemic inflammation in COVID-19 generates endogenous heparinoids from the endothelium which leads to secondary organ failures. We prospectively studied the dynamic association of the coagulation abnormalities with respiratory failure and mortality in patients with COVID-19.Methods: We did a prospective observational study in adults aged between 18-80 years with COVID 19 pneumonia requiring intensive care (ICU) admissions in a tertiary care hospital in North India. All patients received standard medical therapy based on best available evidence. Patients were categorized based on the oxygen support therapy into low flow, high flow and invasive ventilation groups. In patients considered to be at risk of thromboembolic or bleeding phenomena, paired coagulation tests were performed at days 1 and 3 with, Sonoclot ® (glass beaded and heparinase-treated). All patients were consecutively followed for inflammatory markers, ventilator requirements and survival. Activated clotting time (ACT) <110s and peak amplitude > 75 units were used as the cut-off for hypercoagulable state. The heparin like effect (HLE) was considered by a correction of ≥ 40 s in hACT (heparinized treated ACT). The trial is registered with ClinicalTrials.gov (NCT04668404).Results: A total of 2324 patients with COVID-19 were screened from August 2020 to November 2020. Two hundred and fifteen patients requiring ICU admission were assessed and 74 patients with a median age of 54(42-67) years were enrolled. A procoagulant profile was seen in 45.5%, 32.4% and 20.7% in low-flow, high-flow, and invasive ventilation. Paired Sonoclot ® assays in 33 patients demonstrated HLE in 17 (51.5%) and 20 (62.5%) at days 1 and 3 respectively. In multivariate analysis, the presence of HLE (HR 1.02; CI 1.08-1.6; p < 0.05), C-reactive protein (HR 1.2; CI 1.1-1.4; p=0.014)] and platelet function (HR 0.9; CI 0.7-1.1 p < 0.05) predicted mortality. The presence of HLE at day 1 predicted the need for invasive ventilation (HR 1.4; CI 1.01-1.5; p <0.05). An ACT > 131 s, clot rate < 27.5 units/min and CRP > 96.7 mg/l at admission predicted mortality.Conclusions: HLE contributes to hypocoagulable effect, need for invasive ventilation and mortality in patients with COVID-19.Trial Registration: The trial is registered with ClinicalTrials.gov (NCT04668404).Funding Statement: NoneDeclaration of Interests: NoneEthics Approval Statement: Ethical clearance was obtained from the Institutional Review Board (PGI/IEC/2020/000997 dated 24 August 2020)