DOI: 10.36347/sasjm.2021.v07i07.001

Pages: 295-303

Background: COVID-19 has disrupted many countries worldwide; its high mortality and spread has overwhelmed the healthcare systems. Hence it has become important to identify reliable predictors of disease severity and morbidity which would streamline healthcare resources into improving efficiency of management and thus improving the clinical burden and overall outcome. Since dyslipidemia in COVID-19 has been associated with worse outcomes, it can be determined by lipid parameters at admission and its trends. Aim: To correlate serum lipid parameters levels in COVID-19 patients, admitted in an Indian setting, with clinical outcome. Methods: A single-center, observational cross-sectional study was conducted in COVID-19 positive patients admitted from April1st, 2021 to May 1st, 2021. The diagnosis was confirmed by Real-Time Polymerase Chain Reaction (RT-PCR). Each serum lipid parameter was compared to clinical outcomes and checked for statistical association. Results: A total of 157 COVID-19 patients were studied. By the Mann-Whitney test TC median values were 109.5 in the Non survivors and 138 in survivor group (p value <0.05), HDL was 13 in non survivors and 33 in survivors. LDL was 18 in the non-survivor group and 46 (p-value <0.05 for both). The median TG in the group that succumbed to death was 48 as compared to the survivor group which was 138 (p value <0.05). HDL/LDL ratio was 0.14 in non-survivor group and 0.29 in survivors. However, the VLDL-C levels and TC/HDL showed a significant increase in the group that succumbed to death as compared to the group that survived (p=0.003 and p<0.05). ROC curve showed that HDL-C has maximum AUC of 9.77 and least standard error 0.013. Conclusion: Hypolipidemia was seen among many COVID-19 patients and had a strong association with the outcome of the disease. Most sensitive being the levels of HDL-C cholesterol at admission, which could be potentially be used as a cost-free test at the time of triaging patients based on ........