characteristics and outcomes of hospitalized patients with cardiovascular complications of covid-19

Introduction: to address cardiovascular (cv) complications and their relationship to clinical outcomes in hospitalized patients with covid-19. methods: a total of 196 hospitalized patients with covid-19 were enrolled in this retrospective single-center cohort study from september 10, 2020, to december 10, 2020, with a median age of 65 years (iqr, 52-77). follow-up continued for 3 months after hospital discharge. results: cv complication was observed in 54 (27.6%) patients, with arrhythmia being the most prevalent (14.8%) followed by myocarditis, acute coronary syndromes, st-elevation myocardial infarction, cerebrovascular accident, and deep vein thrombosis in 15 (7.7%), 12 (6.1%), 10 (5.1%), 8 (4.1%), and 4 (2%) patients, respectively. the proportion of patients with elevated high-sensitivity troponin i, n-terminal pro-b-type natriuretic peptide, left ventricular diastolic dysfunction, and heart failure with preserved ejection fraction was greater in the cv complication group. severe forms of covid-19 comprised nearly two-thirds (64.3%) of our study population and constituted a significantly higher share of the cv complication group members (75.9% vs 59.9%; p = 0.036). intensive care unit admission (64.8% vs 44.4%; p = 0.011) and stay (5.5 days vs 0 day; p = 0.032) were notably higher in patients with cv complications. among 196 patients, 50 died during hospitalization and 10 died after discharge, yielding all-cause mortality of 30.8%. however, there were no between-group differences concerning mortality. age, heart failure, cancer/autoimmune disease, disease severity, interferon beta-1a, and arrhythmia were the independent predictors of all-cause mortality during and after hospitalization. conclusion: cv complications occurred widely among covid-19 patients. moreover, arrhythmia, as the most common complication, was associated with increased mortality.