Massachusetts General Hospital Covid-19 Registry reveals two distinct populations of hospitalized patients by race and ethnicity

ObjectiveTo evaluate differences by race/ethnicity in clinical characteristics and outcomes among hospitalized patients with Covid-19 at Massachusetts General Hospital (MGH). MethodsThe MGH Covid-19 Registry includes confirmed SARS-CoV-2-infected patients hospitalized at MGH and is based on manual chart reviews and data extraction from electronic health records (EHRs). We evaluated differences between White/Non-Hispanic and Hispanic patients in demographics, complications and 14-day outcomes among the N=866 patients hospitalized with Covid-19 from March 11, 2020 - May 4, 2020. ResultsOverall, 43% of patients hospitalized with Covid-19 were women, median age was 60.4 [IQR=(48.2, 75)], 11.3% were Black/non-Hispanic and 35.2% were Hispanic. Hispanic patients, representing 35.2% of patients, were younger than White/non-Hispanic patients [median age 51y; IQR=(40.6, 61.6) versus 72y; (58.0, 81.7) (p< 0.001)]. Hispanic patients were symptomatic longer before presenting to care (median 5 vs 3d, p=0.039) but were more likely to be sent home with self-quarantine than be admitted to hospital (29% vs 16%, p< 0.001). Hispanic patients had fewer comorbidities yet comparable rates of ICU or death (34% vs 36%). Nonetheless, a greater proportion of Hispanic patients recovered by 14 days after presentation (62% vs 45%, p< 0.001; OR=1.99, p=0.011 in multivariable adjusted model) and fewer died (2% versus 18%, p< 0.001). ConclusionsHospitalized Hispanic patients were younger and had fewer comorbidities compared to White/non-Hispanic patients; despite comparable rates of ICU care or death, a greater proportion recovered. These results have implications for public health policy and the design and conduct of clinical trials.

COVID-19 Outpatient Screening: a Prediction Score for Adverse Events

BackgroundWe sought to develop an automatable score to predict hospitalization, critical illness, or death in patients at risk for COVID-19 presenting for urgent care during the Massachusetts outbreak. MethodsSingle-center study of adult outpatients seen in respiratory illness clinics (RICs) or the emergency department (ED), including development (n = 9381, March 7-May 2) and prospective (n = 2205, May 3-14) cohorts. Data was queried from Partners Enterprise Data Warehouse. Outcomes were hospitalization, critical illness or death within 7 days. We developed the COVID-19 Acuity Score (CoVA) using automatically extracted data from the electronic medical record and learning-to-rank ordinal logistic regression modeling. Calibration was assessed using predicted-to-observed ratio (E/O). Discrimination was assessed by C-statistics (AUC). ResultsIn the development cohort, 27.3%, 7.2%, and 1.1% of patients experienced hospitalization, critical illness, or death, respectively; and in the prospective cohort, 26.1%, 6.3%, and 0.5%. CoVA showed excellent performance in the development cohort (concurrent validation) for hospitalization (E/O: 1.00, AUC: 0.80); for critical illness (E/O: 1.00, AUC: 0.82); and for death (E/O: 1.00, AUC: 0.87). Performance in the prospective cohort (prospective validation) was similar for hospitalization (E/O: 1.01, AUC: 0.76); for critical illness (E/O 1.03, AUC: 0.79); and for death (E/O: 1.63, AUC=0.93). Among 30 predictors, the top five were age, diastolic blood pressure, blood oxygen saturation, COVID-19 testing status, and respiratory rate. ConclusionsCoVA is a prospectively validated automatable score to assessing risk for adverse outcomes related to COVID-19 infection in the outpatient setting.