Objective: Our study determined the association of pregnancy with various clinical outcomes among women with COVID-19 infection.
Methods: We conducted a retrospective, cohort, subgroup analysis of the Philippine CORONA Study datasets comparing the clinical/neurological manifestations and outcomes of pregnant and nonpregnant women admitted in 37 Philippine hospitals for COVID-19 infection.
Results: We included 2448 women in the analyses (322 pregnant and 2.126 nonpregnant). Logistic regression models showed that crude odds ratio (OR) for mortality (OR 0.26 [95% CI 0.11, 0.66]), respiratory failure [OR 0.37 [95% CI 0.17, 0.80]), need for intensive care (OR 0.39 [95% CI 0.19, 0.80]), and prolonged length of hospital stay (OR 1.73 [95% CI 1.36, 2.19]) among pregnant women were significant. After adjusting for age, disease severity, and new-onset neurological symptoms, only the length of hospital stay remained significant (adjusted OR 1.99 [95% CI 1.56,2.54]). Cox regression models revealed that the unadjusted hazard ratio (HR) for mortality (HR 0.22 [95% CI 0.09, 0.55]) among pregnant women was statistically significant; however, after adjustment, the HR for mortality became nonsignificant.
Conclusion: We did not find a significantly increased risk of mortality, respiratory failure, and need for ICU admission in pregnant women compared with nonpregnant women with COVID-19. However, the likelihood of hospital confinement beyond 14 days was twice more likely among pregnant women than nonpregnant women with COVID-19.
Keywords: COVID-19; ICU admission; mortality; pregnancy; respiratory failure.