(HealthDay News) — Across hospital types, there is a comparably detrimental relationship between COVID-19 caseload and patient survival, according to a study published online Sept. 10 in the Annals of Internal Medicine.
Maniraj Neupane, MD, PhD, from the National Institutes of Health Clinical Center in Bethesda, MD, and colleagues conducted a retrospective cohort study to examine whether hospital type classified by capabilities and resources influenced COVID-19 volume-outcome relationships during the delta wave. The study included adult inpatients with COVID-19 admitted to 620 US hospitals during July to November 2021.
Of the 620 hospitals recording 223,380 inpatients with COVID-19, 208 were extracorporeal membrane oxygenation-capable, 216 had multiple intensive care units (ICUs), 36 had large (≥200 beds) single ICUs, and 160 had small (<200 beds) single ICUs. The researchers found that 23% of the patients required admission to the ICU and 15.3% died. Per unit increase in the log surge index, the marginally adjusted probability for mortality was 5.51% (strain-attributable mortality: 7,375 or one in five COVID-19 deaths). Across the four hospital types, the test for interaction showed no difference in the log surge index-mortality relationship.
“We encourage future studies that examine whether the risks for high pandemic caseloads across hospital types identified in our study extend to patients with non-COVID-19 conditions during the pandemic and nonpandemic times,” the authors write.
