With the onset of the coronavirus pandemic, it has become clear that patients with diabetes are at risk for more severe and fatal COVID-19. Type 2 diabetes mellitus (T2D) is a major risk factor for adverse COVID-19 outcomes. The goal of study was to assess the characteristics and outcomes of hospitalized patients with COVID-19 with or without T2D in the hospital and at 10-month follow-up (FU).
Methods: A total of 2486 hospitalized patients in the first wave of COVID-19 were analyzed according to the absence/presence of T2D, with 2082 (84.1%) patients in the control COVID-19 group and 381 (15.5%) in the T2D group. Twenty-three patients had other types of diabetes and were therefore excluded from the study. In-hospital mortality and cardiovascular endpoints (myocardial infarction, stroke, cardiovascular deaths and hospitalizations and composite endpoints) at the 10-month follow-up were analyzed. To remove bias in patients' characteristics disproportion, Propensity Score Matching (PSM) was used for hospital and follow-up endpoints.
Results: Hospital mortality was considerably greater in T2D than in the control COVID-19 group (13.89% vs. 4.89%, p < 0.0001), and the difference remained after PSM (p < 0.0001). Higher glucose-level T2D patients had a higher mortality rate (p = 0.018). The most significant predictors of hospital death in T2D patients were a high CRP, glucose, neutrophils count, and Charlson Comorbidity Index. The follow-up of patients over 10 months showed a non-significant increase for all endpoints in the T2D group (p > 0.05), and significant increase in stroke (p < 0.042). After the PSM, the difference decreased in stroke (p = 0.090), but became significant in cardiovascular hospitalizations (p = 0.023).
Conclusion: In T2D patients with COVID-19, an increase in hospital mortality, stroke and cardiovascular hospitalizations rates in the follow-up was observed.
Keywords: COVID-19; diabetes mellitus; follow-up; mortality; outcomes; risk factors.