Correlation between Chest Computed Tomography ScanFindings and Mortality of COVID-19 Cases; a Cross sec-tional Study

Predicting the outcomes of COVID-19 cases using different clinical, laboratory, and imaging pa-rameters is one of the most interesting fields of research in this regard. This study aimed to evaluate the correla-tion between chest computed tomography (CT) scan findings and outcomes of COVID-19 cases.

Thiscross sectional study was carried out on confirmed COVID-19 cases with clinical manifestations and chest CTscan findings based on Iran’s National Guidelines for defining COVID-19. Baseline and chest CT scan character-istics of patients were investigated and their correlation with mortality was analyzed and reported using SPSS21.0.

380 patients with the mean age of 53.62±16.66 years were evaluated (66.1% male). The mostfrequent chest CT scan abnormalities were in peripheral (86.6%) and peribronchovascular interstitium (34.6%),with ground glass pattern (54.1%), and round (53.6%) or linear (46.7%) shape. There was a significant correlationbetween shape of abnormalities (p = 0.003), CT scan Severity Score (CTSS) (p <0.0001), and pulmonary arteryCT diameter (p = 0. 01) with mortality. The mean CTSS of non-survived cases was significantly higher (13.68±4.59 versus 8.72±4.42; <0.0001). The area under the receiver operating characteristic (ROC) curve of CTSS inpredicting the patients’ mortality was 0.800 (95% CI: 0.716-0.884). The best cut off point of chest CTSS in thisregard was 12 with 75.82% (95% CI: 56.07%-88.98%) sensitivity and 75.78% (95% CI: 70.88%-80.10%) specificity.The mean main pulmonary artery diameter in patients with CTSS≥12 was higher than cases with CTSS < 12(27.89±3.73 vs 26.24±3.14 mm; p < 0.0001).

Based on the results of the present study it seemsthat there is a significant correlation between chest CT scan characteristics and mortality of COVID-19 cases.Patients with lower CTSS, lower pulmonary artery CT diameter, and round shape opacity had lower mortality.