Clinical Characteristics and Outcomes of 821 Older Patients With SARS-Cov-2 Infection Admitted to Acute Care Geriatric Wards.

BACKGROUND: There is limited information describing the characteristics and outcomes of hospitalized older patients with confirmed coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19). METHOD: We conducted a multicentric retrospective cohort study in 13 acute COVID-19 geriatric wards, from March 13 to April 15, 2020, in Paris area. All consecutive patients aged 70 years and older, with confirmed COVID-19, were enrolled. RESULTS: Of the 821 patients included in the study, the mean (SD) age was 86 (7) years; 58% were female; 85% had ≥2 comorbidities; 29% lived in an institution; and the median [interquartile range] Activities of Daily Living scale (ADL) score was 4 [2-6]. The most common symptoms at COVID-19 onset were asthenia (63%), fever (55%), dyspnea (45%), dry cough (45%), and delirium (25%). The in-hospital mortality was 31% (95% confidence interval [CI] 27-33). On multivariate analysis, at COVID-19 onset, the probability of in-hospital mortality was increased with male gender (odds ratio [OR] 1.85; 95% CI 1.30-2.63), ADL score <4 (OR 1.84; 95% CI 1.25-2.70), asthenia (OR 1.59; 95% CI 1.08-2.32), quick Sequential Organ Failure Assessment score ≥2 (OR 2.63; 95% CI 1.64-4.22), and specific COVID-19 anomalies on chest computerized tomography (OR 2.60; 95% CI 1.07-6.46). CONCLUSIONS: This study provides new information about older patients with COVID-19 who are hospitalized. A quick bedside evaluation at admission of sex, functional status, systolic arterial pressure, consciousness, respiratory rate, and asthenia can identify older patients at risk of unfavorable outcomes.

A systematic review of retracted publications in emergency medicine.

The objective of this study was to characterize retracted publications in emergency medicine. We searched MEDLINE, Web of Science and Cochrane Central Register of Controlled Trials to identify all retracted publications in the field of emergency medicine. We also searched an independent website that reports and archives retracted scientific publications. Two researchers independently screened titles, abstracts and full text of search results. Data from all included studies were then independently extracted. We identified 28 retraction notes. Eleven (39%) articles were published by authors from Europe. The oldest retracted article was published in 2001. The 28 retracted papers were published by 22 different journals. Two authors were named on multiples retractions. The median impact factor of journals was 1.03 (0.6-1.9). Almost all studies were available online [26/28 (93%)], but only 40% had watermarking on the article. The retraction notification was available for all articles. Three (11%) retraction notices did not clearly report the retraction reasons, and most retraction notices were issued by the editors [14 (56%)]. The most frequent retraction reasons were plagiarism [eight (29%)], duplicate publication [three (11%)] and overlap [two (2%)]. Retracted articles were cited on average 14 times. In most cases, the retraction cause did not invalidate the study's results [17 (60%)]. The most common reason for retraction was related to a misconduct by the authors. These results can question the necessity to normalize retraction procedures among the large number of biomedical editors and to educate future researchers on research integrity.