Circulating Markers of Angiogenesis and Endotheliopathy in COVID-19

ABSTRACT

Despite over 9.3 million infected and 479,000 deaths, the pathophysiological factors that determine the wide spectrum of clinical outcomes in COVID-19 remain inadequately defined. Importantly, patients with underlying cardiovascular disease have been found to have worse clinical outcomes,1 and autopsy findings of endotheliopathy as well as angiogenesis in COVID-19 have accumulated.2,3 Nonetheless, circulating vascular markers associated with disease severity and mortality have not been reliably established. To address this limitation and better understand COVID-19 pathogenesis, we report plasma profiling of factors related to the vascular system from a series of patients admitted to Yale-New Haven Hospital with confirmed diagnosis of COVID-19 via PCR, which demonstrate significant increase in markers of angiogenesis and endotheliopathy in patients hospitalized with COVID-19.