Assessment of some prescribed drugs in the management of COVID-19 on the survival function: A preliminary report from a single center in Iraq

Abstract

Several medications are used to treat the patients and to control the spread of the disease. Some of these drugs proved to be harmful besides drug-drug interactions can be occurred particularly in old-age groups or patients with chronic diseases. This study aimed to investigate the effects of several drugs on the survival outcome of COVID-19 patients hospitalized in a single medical center in Erbil, Iraq. 204 patients (128 men and 76 women) with COVID-19 were recruited from the West Erbil Emergency hospital between August 10 and November 20, 2020. The primary outcome measures were the survival rate during the course of illness taking into consideration the number and the generic name of prescribed drugs, the percentage of saturated blood oxygen (sPO2), and the age. A total number of sixty-four patients died. Non-survivors are characterized by having a significantly lower percentage of sPO2 and used a significantly high mean value of a number (4-5) of drugs during the course of treatment. The percentage of non-survivors who used fluoroquinolones was significantly higher than the corresponding percentage of survivors (37.5 vs 21.4, p=0.016). The cumulative odds ratio (> 1.0) was observed significantly (χ2= 6.286, p=0.012) in patients who used five-drug items despite the sPO2≥ 90%. We conclude that drug combinations of more than three drugs are harmful in old-age group patients, and dexamethasone, carbapenems, and fluoroquinolones should be not prescribed as empiric therapy.