Introduction: Numerous case series have reported on the baseline characteristics and in-hospital mortality of patients with COVID-19, however, these studies included patients localized in a specific geographic region. The purpose of our study was to identify differences in the clinical characteristics and the in-hospital mortality of patients with a laboratory-confirmed diagnosis of COVID-19 internationally.
Methods: A comprehensive search of all published literature on adult patients with laboratory-confirmed diagnosis of COVID-19 that reported on the clinical characteristics and in-hospital mortality was performed. Groups were compared using a Chi-square test with Yates correction of continuity. A two-tailed p value of less than 0.05 was considered as statistically significant.
Results: After screening 516 studies across the globe, 43 studies from 12 countries were included in our final analysis. Patients with COVID-19 in America and Europe were older compared to their Asian counterparts. Europe had the highest percentage of male patients. American and European patients had a higher incidence of co-morbid conditions (p < 0.05 for all variables). In-hospital mortality was significantly higher in America (22.23%) and Europe (22.9%) compared to Asia (12.65%) (p < 0.0001), but no difference was seen when compared with each other (p = 0.49).
Conclusions: There is a significant variation in the clinical characteristics in patients diagnosed with COVID-19 across the globe. In-hospital mortality is similar between America and Europe, but considerably higher than Asia.
Keywords: COVID-19; Clinical characteristics; In-hospital mortality.