differential diagnostic utility of clinical laboratory data in patients with severe and non-severe covid-19

Background: coronavirus disease 2019 (covid-19) is a coronavirus outbreak caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 infection. objectives: this study aimed to investigate the relationship between laboratory variables and covid-19 severity. methods: a total of 731 confirmed cases were included in this study. based on the clinical course of the disease, the patients were divided into non-severe (n = 599) and severe (n = 132) groups. the area under the curve was estimated for each of the significant predictive factors by the receiver operating characteristic curve. youden’s index was used to determine the optimal cut-off points to predict the severity of covid-19. results: out of 731 patients, 407 (55.56%) cases were male. the mean age value and age range of the patients were 58.37 and 1 - 98 years, respectively. the age (or = 1.03, 95% ci: 1.02 - 1.05), international normalized ratio (inr) (or = 2.09, 95% ci: 1.11 - 3.96), lactate dehydrogenase (ldh) (or = 1.003, 95% ci: 1.001 - 1.1.003), and neutrophil/lymphocyte ratio (nlr) (or = 1.08, 95% ci: 1.02 - 1.14) were associated with the severity of covid-19 in the multivariate analyses. the areasunder the curve of ldh,nlr,andinrfor the diagnosis of disease severity were 0.76, 0.69, and 0.62, respectively. conclusions: the results of this study revealed that ldh, nlr, and inr could help to discriminate between non-severe and severe covid-19 cases. therefore, clinicians can use these variables to improve therapeutic effects and reduce disease severity.