Journal of computer assisted tomography, vol.44, no.5, pp.633-639, 2020 (SCI-Expanded)
Objective To investigate the role of chest computed tomography (CT) examinations acquired early after initial onset of symptoms in predicting disease course in coronavirus disease 2019. Methods Two hundred sixty-two patients were categorized according to intensive care unit (ICU) admission, survival, length of hospital stay, and reverse transcriptase-polymerase chain reaction positivity. Mean time interval between the onset of symptoms and CT scan was 5.2 +/- 2.3 days. Groups were compared using Studentttest, Mann-WhitneyU, and Fisher exact tests. Results In the ICU (+) and died groups, crazy paving (64% and 57.1%), bronchus distortion (68% and 66.7%), bronchiectasis-bronchiolectasis (80% and 76.2%), air trapping (52% and 52.4%) and mediastinal-hilar lymph node enlargement (52% and 52.4%) were significantly more encountered (P< 0,05). These findings were correlated with longer hospital stays (P< 0.05). There were no differences between reverse transcriptase-polymerase chain reaction-positive and -negative patients except bronchiectasis-bronchiolectasis. Conclusion Computed tomography examinations performed early after the onset of symptoms may help in predicting disease course and planning of resources, such as ICU beds.