Introduction: There is limited data on clinical course and outcomes of hospitalized adults with COVID-19 in Nepal. Thus, it is imperative to characterize the features of this disease in the domestic context.
Methodology: We identified all adult patients with laboratory-confirmed COVID-19 admitted to five different hospitals in Nepal from June 15 to July 15, 2020. We collected epidemiological, socio-cultural and clinicopathologic data, and stratified the patients based on their symptom status.
Results: The study included 220 patients with an overall median age of 31.5 (25-37) years, and 181 (82.3%) were males. 159 (72.3%) were asymptomatic, and 163 (74.1%) were imported cases. Of 217 patients with the available data, 110 (50.7%) reported their annual household income less than 2000 US dollars, and 122 (56.2%) practiced Pranayama (yogic rhythmic breathing techniques) regularly. Eight patients (3.6%) required supplemental oxygen and two patients (0.9%) died. None of the patients who practiced Pranayama regularly required supplemental oxygen. Compared to asymptomatic patients, symptomatic patients had greater proportion of females (31.1% vs. 12.6%, p = 0.001), imported cases (85.2% vs. 69.8%, p = 0.02), illiterates (26.8% vs. 12.1%, p = 0.01), alcohol users (43.3% vs. 24.5%, p = 0.01), and had higher platelet count (253×109/L vs. 185×109/L, p = 0.02).
Conclusions: Most cases were imported, asymptomatic young males, with very few deaths. Pranayama practice was associated with protection against severe COVID-19, but more data is needed to substantiate this. The association of platelets count with symptom status in the Nepalese population needs further exploration.
Keywords: Epidemiology; Nepal; South Asia; yoga.
Copyright (c) 2022 Ashok Chaudhary, Uday Narayan Singh, Pramod Paudel, Niresh Thapa, Kamal Khadka, Prameshwar Kumar Sah, Sher Bahadur Kamar, Jagadish Joshi, Kamar Hasan Ansari, Shree Ram Tiwari, Sarbesh Sharma, Sanjay Kumar Jaiswal, Ramesh Joshi, Samikchya Baskota, Arjun Prasad Tiwari, Hem Raj Pandey.