Two original observations concerning bacterial infections in COVID-19 patients hospitalized in intensive care units during the first wave of the epidemic in France

Camille d'Humières; Juliette Patrier; Brice Lortat-Jacob; Alexy Tran-Dinh; Lotfi Chemali; Naouale Maataoui; Emilie Rondinaud; Etienne Ruppé; Charles Burdet; Stéphane Ruckly; Philippe Montravers; Jean-François Timsit; Laurence Armand-Lefevre

doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0250728

Two original observations concerning bacterial infections in COVID-19 patients hospitalized in intensive care units during the first wave of the epidemic in France

PLoS One. 2021 Apr 29;16(4):e0250728. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0250728. eCollection 2021.

Authors

Camille d'Humières^{1

2}, Juliette Patrier³, Brice Lortat-Jacob⁴, Alexy Tran-Dinh^{4

5}, Lotfi Chemali², Naouale Maataoui^{1

2}, Emilie Rondinaud^{1

2}, Etienne Ruppé^{1

2}, Charles Burdet^{1

6}, Stéphane Ruckly³, Philippe Montravers^{4

7}, Jean-François Timsit^{1

3}, Laurence Armand-Lefevre^{1

2}

Affiliations

¹ Université de Paris, INSERM, IAME, Paris, France.
² AP-HP, Hôpital Bichat, Bacteriology, Paris, France.
³ AP-HP, Hôpital Bichat, Medical and Infectious Diseases ICU (MI2), Paris, France.
⁴ Department of Anesthesiology and Surgical Critical Care, AP-HP, Hôpital Bichat, Paris, France.
⁵ Université de Paris, INSERM U 1148, Paris, France.
⁶ Département d'Epidémiologie, Biostatistique et Recherche Clinique, AP-HP, Hôpital Bichat, Paris, France.
⁷ INSERM 1152 -ANR-10-LABX-17, Paris, France.

Abstract

Among 197 COVID-19 patients hospitalized in ICU, 88 (44.7%) experienced at least one bacterial infection, with pneumonia (39.1%) and bloodstream infections (15,7%) being the most frequent. Unusual findings include frequent suspicion of bacterial translocations originating from the digestive tract as well as bacterial persistence in the lungs despite adequate therapy.

MeSH terms

Aged
Bacterial Infections / complications*
Bacterial Infections / epidemiology
COVID-19 / complications*
COVID-19 / epidemiology
Female
France / epidemiology
Hospitalization
Humans
Intensive Care Units
Lung / microbiology
Lung / virology
Male
Middle Aged
Pneumonia, Bacterial / complications*
Pneumonia, Bacterial / epidemiology

Grants and funding

The authors received no specific funding for this work.