Serum iron level in patients with COVID-19: a case report study

Coronavirus disease emerged in Wuhan, China in December 2019 and led to worldwide pandemic in March 2020. Due to early diagnose, treatment and prevent transmission of COVID-19 disease, we need rapid laboratory tests and develop them. This paper focuses on serum Iron level in patients with COVID-19. We assess the serum Iron level due to the following reasons: I. Iron is a key part of hemoglobin structure in which is essential for providing Oxygen to the body organs, particularly for the patients with pulmonary involvement such as COVID-19. II. Iron deficiency can contribute to muscle weakness and reduction of respiratory capacity, at which increases the risk of deterioration of COVID-19 patients. III. Elevation in Hepcidin level (due to the increase in IL-6 level) in COVID-19 patients inhibits Iron absorption from intestinal lumen and blocks the Iron release from macrophages. IV. Iron is an essential element in infectious suppress and inflammatory process. We noticed that most of the patients, especially admitted to hospital due to the respiratory symptoms, have lower serum Iron level

The impact of mental illnesses on the clinical manifestations of COVID-19 patients

Background: The underlying medical conditions with COVID-19 patients may affect the clinical symptoms, morbidity and mortality. Due to the high prevalence of mental illnesses and their impact on inflammatory processes and pulmonary function, we evaluated the impact of depression and anxiety as the highest prevalence of mental illness on clinical manifestations of COVID-19 patients.Methods: A questionnaire form about past medical history completed for the COVID-19 patients. Patients with underlying depression and anxiety excluded and compared with the patients without comorbidities of medical or mental conditions in terms of the common clinical manifestations.Results: Total out of the 560 patients reviewed, 174 patients had no history of any disease (named as group A). 39 patients had the history of depression only and 45 patients had the history of anxiety only (respectively named as groups B and C). There was a high and meaningful frequency of feeling dyspnea (p value 0.05).Conclusions: Comorbidity of depression and anxiety may affect the clinical symptoms in patients with COVID-19. Respiratory symptoms (e.g., cough, tachypnea and feeling dyspnea), tachycardia and chest pain are the more manifested symptoms in the patients with depression and anxiety and may be due to their underlying disease. The impact of mental illnesses on morbidity and mortality of COVID-19 patients remains unclear and requires further studies