Correlation of important prognostic factors and CT scores in invasive and non-invasive ventilation of COVID-19 patients

BACKGROUND: Intensive care workers received the largest share of the COVID-19 pandemic, which caused nightmares to the whole world. In COVID-19 pneumonia cases which had high mortality rates, many prognostic factors and laboratory examinations were tried to evaluate the clinical severity quickly and accurately.This study was planned to investigate a correlation between the initially ventilation strategy and major prognostic parameters and CT scores in patients admitted to intensive care unit (ICU). METHODS: In our study, we reviewed 50 consecutive non-invasive mv and 50 consecutive invasive mv treatment of COVID-19 pneumonia patients between March 23, 2020,and May 23, 2020, in the ICUs of our hospital. Patients who were divided into twogroups (non-invasive mechanical ventilation [NIMV] and invasive mechanical ventilation [IMV]) as an initial ventilation strategy according to clinical severity and P/F ratios were evaluated comparatively; demographic data, admission and lowest P/F ratios, admission and highest SOFA scores, comorbidity status, scores on CT at diagnosis, length of ICU stays, hospitalization periods, and mortality rates were examined. RESULTS: About 85% of all patients were 46 years and older. No significant difference was found in terms of gender and comorbidity status. The lowest P/F ratio was significantly lower in IMV group. The admission and highest SOFA values were higher in the IMV group. There was no significant difference between the CT scores and the number of lobes involved. The mortality rate in the IMV group was significantly higher. CONCLUSION: Patients who started treatment with NIMV had relatively low poor prognostic factors, their mortality was lower. However, the total CT score at diagnosis was expected to be higher in those who were performed IMV, no significant difference was found in our study. We concluded that the severity classification of the patients cannot be made according to CT scores. CT results should be evaluated as a whole according to the patient’s clinic, predisposing factors, and response to treatment.