The longitudinal characterization of immune responses in COVID-19 patients reveals novel prognostic signatures for disease severity, patients' survival and long COVID.
Front Immunol
; 15: 1381091, 2024.
Article
in En
| MEDLINE
| ID: mdl-39136010
ABSTRACT
Introduction:
SARS-CoV-2 pandemic still poses a significant burden on global health and economy, especially for symptoms persisting beyond the acute disease. COVID-19 manifests with various degrees of severity and the identification of early biomarkers capable of stratifying patient based on risk of progression could allow tailored treatments.Methods:
We longitudinally analyzed 67 patients, classified according to a WHO ordinal scale as having Mild, Moderate, or Severe COVID-19. Peripheral blood samples were prospectively collected at hospital admission and during a 6-month follow-up after discharge. Several subsets and markers of the innate and adaptive immunity were monitored as putative factors associated with COVID-19 symptoms.Results:
More than 50 immunological parameters were associated with disease severity. A decision tree including the main clinical, laboratory, and biological variables at admission identified low NK-cell precursors and CD14+CD91+ monocytes, and high CD8+ Effector Memory T cell frequencies as the most robust immunological correlates of COVID-19 severity and reduced survival. Moreover, low regulatory B-cell frequency at one month was associated with the susceptibility to develop long COVID at six months, likely due to their immunomodulatory ability.Discussion:
These results highlight the profound perturbation of the immune response during COVID-19. The evaluation of specific innate and adaptive immune-cell subsets allows to distinguish between different acute and persistent COVID-19 symptoms.Key words
Full text:
1
Collection:
01-internacional
Database:
MEDLINE
Main subject:
Severity of Illness Index
/
SARS-CoV-2
/
COVID-19
Limits:
Adult
/
Aged
/
Female
/
Humans
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Male
/
Middle aged
Language:
En
Journal:
Front Immunol
Year:
2024
Document type:
Article
Affiliation country:
Italy
Country of publication:
Switzerland