Published online May 26, 2021. doi: 10.12998/wjcc.v9.i15.3546
Peer-review started: January 5, 2021
First decision: January 17, 2021
Revised: January 21, 2021
Accepted: March 6, 2021
Article in press: March 6, 2021
Published online: May 26, 2021
The effectiveness of adjunctive corticosteroid use in patients with coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) remains inconclusive.
To investigate the effectiveness of adjunctive corticosteroid therapy in patients with severe COVID-19.
We conducted a retrospective analysis of the difference in several outcomes between patients with severe COVID-19 who received corticosteroid therapy (the corticosteroid group) and patients with severe COVID-19 who did not receive corticosteroid therapy (the non-corticosteroid group).
Seventy-five patients were included in this study. Of these, 47 patients were in the corticosteroid group and 28 patients were in the non-corticosteroid group. There were no differences between the two groups in the total length of hospital stay, the length of intensive care unit stay, high-flow oxygen days, non-invasive ventilator days, invasive ventilation days, and mortality rate. Total lesion volume ratio, consolidation volume ratio and ground-glass opacity volume ratio in the corticosteroid group decreased significantly on day 14, while those in the non-corticosteroid group did not show a significant decrease.
Our results show that adjunctive corticosteroid use did not significantly improve clinical outcomes in severe COVID-19 patients, but might promote the absorption of pulmonary lesions. Larger multicenter randomized controlled studies may be needed to confirm this.
Core Tip: Corticosteroids have been used in the treatment of severe acute respiratory syndrome, Middle East respiratory syndrome and coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19). Many studies believe that corticosteroids have an inhibitory effect on inflammatory factors caused by viruses. In this study, 75 patients with severe COVID-19 were studied and divided into either the treatment group or the control group according to corticosteroid use. We found that adjunctive corticosteroid use did not significantly improve clinical outcomes in severe COVID-19 patients, but might promote the absorption of pulmonary lesions.