Demographic, Clinical, and Paraclinical Characteristics of the Fourth Surge of the COVID-19 Pandemic in Ardabil Province, Iran

Background: Coronavirus disease-2019 (COVID-19), an infectious disease, has been known as a worldwide pandemic involving many countries, including Iran. Meantime, the analyses of clinical and demographic features of the fourth surge in COVID-19 patients provide a better overview of disease management and mortality reduction. Objective: This study aimed to identify the effective clinical and demographic hallmarks of the fourth wave of COVID-19 in Ardabil Province, Iran. Methods: We carried out a population-based analytical cross-sectional study using clinical and demographic characteristics of COVID-19 from February 2021 to May 2021 among confirmed COVID-19 patients who were admitted to the hospital during the fourth surge. Predictors of intensive care unit (ICU) admission and death were evaluated by controlling for intervening variables. Findings: We evaluated 500 patients, of whom 54.5% were men, and 45.5% were women. Among them, 35.1% of patients had hypertension as the main comorbidity, followed by diabetes (21.4%), cardiovascular disease (8.4 %), renal diseases (2.4%), and others. The findings indicated that increasing age has increased mortality among patients with COVID-19. Moreover, our results showed that among the analyzed items, age, sex, and cerebral vascular accident (CVA) were indicated as predictors of ICU admission. Conclusion: This evaluation demonstrated that old age and comorbidities are two major risk factors for reducing the probability of recovery and increasing admission to the ICU. Therefore, elderly individuals with at least one co-morbidity are at higher risk of becoming infected.