| The coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic in Iran is part of the worldwide
pandemic caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2). The
present study aimed to demonstrate the clinical characteristics of patients affected by COVID-19,
in our tertiary teaching hospital.
Medical records and compiled data of 668 patients with suspected COVID-19 were obtained
retrospectively between January to April 2020. The present study outcomes included
demographic features of infected patients, underlying diseases and conditions, the relationship
between the results of reverse transcription-polymerase chain reaction (RT-PCR) or CT-scan
with the manifestations of the disease, mortality rate, and age distribution of fatalities among men
and women.
The median age of hospitalized patients was 63 years old (from 18 to 94). The patients’ chief
complaints in the admission time were cough, dyspnea, fever, and gastrointestinal problems,
respectively. Hospitalized patients' common comorbidities were hypertension (HTN), and
cardiovascular disease (CVD) (24%), diabetes mellitus (DM) (21.5%), asthma, or chronic
obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) (6%), or other underlying diseases (15.5%). One-third of
patients had no comorbidity according to the data of medical records. In hospitalized patients,
169 (84.5%) had positive RT-PCR, and 156 (78%) had positive chest CT findings. The mortality
rate of males was higher than females (66.3% vs. 33.3%) and in patients with positive RT-PCR
compared to patients with positive chest CT-scan findings. The majority of deaths had a history
of DM or HTN/CVD in their medical records.
The chief complaint of patients was cough. DM and HTN or CVD were the common
underlying disease related to death in hospitalized cases. Besides, the hospitalization and
mortality rate in males was higher than in females. About 87% of dead hospitalized cases had
positive RT-PCR results, and this rate was 82% for chest CT results. |