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Copyright ©The Author(s) 2023. Published by Baishideng Publishing Group Inc. All rights reserved.
World J Gastroenterol. Jul 14, 2023; 29(26): 4099-4119
Published online Jul 14, 2023. doi: 10.3748/wjg.v29.i26.4099
Impact of COVID-19 in individuals with and without pre-existent digestive disorders with a particular focus on elderly patients
Alfredo Papa, Marcello Covino, Sara Sofia De Lucia, Angelo Del Gaudio, Marcello Fiorani, Giorgia Polito, Carlo Romano Settanni, Andrea Piccioni, Francesco Franceschi, Antonio Gasbarrini
Alfredo Papa, Sara Sofia De Lucia, Angelo Del Gaudio, Marcello Fiorani, Giorgia Polito, Antonio Gasbarrini, CEMAD, Center for Diagnosis and Treatment of Digestive Diseases, Fondazione Policlinico Universitario A. Gemelli, IRCCS, Roma 00168, Italy
Alfredo Papa, CEMAD, Università Cattolica del Sacro Cuore, Roma 00168, Italy
Marcello Covino, Department of Emergency, Università Cattolica del Sacro Cuore - Fondazione Policlinico Universitario A. Gemelli, IRCCS, Rome 00168, Italy
Marcello Covino, Emergency Medicine, Università Cattolica del Sacro Cuore, Roma 00168, Italy
Carlo Romano Settanni, Digestive Disease Center, Fondazione Policlinico Universitario A. Gemelli IRCCS - Università Cattolica del Sacro Cuore, Rome 00168, Italy
Andrea Piccioni, Francesco Franceschi, Department of Emergency, Fondazione Policlinico Universitario A. Gemelli, IRCCS, Roma 00168, Italy
Francesco Franceschi, Department of Emergency, Università Cattolica del Sacro Cuore, Roma 00168, Italy
Author contributions: Papa A and Covino M contributed to the conception and design of this study, analysis and interpretation of data; De Lucia SS, Del Gaudio A, Fiorani M, Polito G, and Settanni CR were involved in the acquisition and collection of data; Papa A, Covino M, De Lucia SS, Del Gaudio A, Fiorani M, Polito G, Settanni CR, Franceschi F, and Gasbarrini A drafted the paper or revised it critically for intellectual content; and all authors approved the final version of the manuscript to be published.
Conflict-of-interest statement: All the authors report no relevant conflicts of interest for this article.
Open-Access: This article is an open-access article that was selected by an in-house editor and fully peer-reviewed by external reviewers. It is distributed in accordance with the Creative Commons Attribution NonCommercial (CC BY-NC 4.0) license, which permits others to distribute, remix, adapt, build upon this work non-commercially, and license their derivative works on different terms, provided the original work is properly cited and the use is non-commercial. See: https://creativecommons.org/Licenses/by-nc/4.0/
Corresponding author: Marcello Covino, MD, PhD, Assistant Professor, Department of Emergency, Università Cattolica del Sacro Cuore - Fondazione Policlinico Universitario A. Gemelli, IRCCS, Largo A. Gemelli 1, Rome 00168, Italy. marcello.covino@policlinicogemelli.it
Received: November 27, 2022
Peer-review started: November 27, 2022
First decision: December 27, 2022
Revised: January 10, 2023
Accepted: March 20, 2023
Article in press: March 20, 2023
Published online: July 14, 2023
Processing time: 224 Days and 9.9 Hours
Core Tip

Core Tip: Gastrointestinal symptoms are frequent in coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19), with more severe consequences reported in elderly patients. Patients with pre-existing liver disease are at an increased risk for worse outcomes, while no definitive conclusions can be drawn regarding patients with inflammatory bowel disease or pancreatic diseases. Elderly patients with digestive disorders, although the available data are limited, have no worse COVID-19 outcomes than those without these diseases.