Complication Severity and Its Association with the COVID-19 Prevention, Management and the Place of Treatment of the COVID-19 Patients in Bangladesh: A Cross-Sectional Study (preprint)

ABSTRACT

This study aimed to explore the extent of COVID-19 complications and its association with the pattern of COVID-19 management and prevention at hospital and home settings in urban Bangladesh. The study included 659 COVID-19 positive patients aged 18 and up who were treated at home or in hospitals and lived in Dhaka city from April to September 2021. Among the respondents, around 79% respondents suffering from mild infection believe that the risk of Covid-19 infection can be decreased by wearing mask, while 21% participants with severe infection had similar opinion and have significant association of wearing masks with infection level (p < .001). The predominant primary symptoms of COVID–19 infection was fever (80.9%), dry cough (60.4%), myalgia (56.6%), headache (50.5%), sneezing (38.2%), chest pain (25.9%), diarrhea (23.2%) and loss of smell/taste (21.5%). About 61.8% participants did not suffer from any co-morbidity. Others suffered mostly from diabetes (22.9%), cardiovascular disease (19.7%) and asthma/COPD (7.9%) as co-morbidities. 80.9% respondents having mild infection and 19.1% having severe infection always practiced all preventive measures as wearing masks, used alcohol-based hand rub and using PPE at workplace to avoid Covid-19 infection. The reported post-recovery symptoms are fatigue/muscle weakness (42.3%), headache (39.3%), loss of taste/smell (29.0%), depression (27.2%), cough (25.8%), breathing difficulty (21.1%), trouble in mobility (19.7%), chest pain (19.4%), loss of memory (18.1%), each of joint pain/arthralgia and fever (17.0%) and weight loss (16.4%). Recovery time was found to be significantly influenced by family income, the number of co-morbidities, and the location of therapy. Furthermore, age, the number of co-morbidities, and educational level were all strongly linked to the treatment location. Government needs to emphasize more on making sure the effective level of management at the hospitals and extensive level of awareness at the community level where concerted efforts is inevitable.