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As COVID-19 cases continue to skyrocket around the world, scientists are still trying to understand the behavior of the disease to stop it and prevent future outbreaks.
According to the report, as of mid-August 2020, more than 22 million laboratory-confirmed cases had been documented worldwide, with more than 770,000 deaths. To date, public health officials have highlighted numerous possible treatments for COVID-19.
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Although it is public knowledge that the virus develops severe symptoms primarily in patients with comorbidities, weak immune systems, or other underlying conditions, there have been numerous exceptions around the world. Even healthy patients without any underlying conditions have been seen to develop severe symptoms or even die due to COVID-19.
Scoring system for COVID-19 tests
Recently, scientists have developed a scoring system for the first time that can accurately predict which hospitalized patients will develop a severe form of COVID-19.
The blood test was developed by researchers at RCSI University of Medicine and Health Sciences in Dublin and the US It is published in The Lancet’s translational research journal EBioMedicine.
This measure, called the Dublin-Boston score, enables physicians to make more informed decisions by identifying patients who may benefit from therapies, such as steroids, and admission to intensive care units. Previously, doctors did not have any kind of COVID-19-specific prognostic score to refer to decision making.
But now, the blood test measurement can accurately predict how severe the infection will be on day 7 after measuring the patient’s blood for the first four days. The 4-day change in the IL-6: IL-10 ratio was chosen to obtain the Dublin-Boston score.
How does it work?
According to the researchers, the blood test works by measuring the levels of two molecules that send messages to the body’s immune system and control inflammation.
One of these molecules, interleukin (IL) -6, is pro-inflammatory and a different one, called IL-10, is anti-inflammatory. The levels of both are altered in patients with severe COVID-19.
Depending on the changes in the ratio of these two molecules over time, the researchers have developed a scoring system in which each 1-point increase was associated with a 5.6 times greater chance of a more severe outcome.
“The Dublin-Boston score is easily calculated and can be applied to all hospitalized Covid-19 patients,” says RCSI professor of medicine Gerry McElvaney, lead author of the study and consultant at Beaumont Hospital.
The Dublin-Boston score uses the ratio of IL-6 to IL-10 because it significantly outperformed the measurement of change in IL-6 alone. Despite high blood levels, the use of only IL-6 measurements as a COVID-19 prognostic tool is hampered by several factors. IL-6 levels within the same patient vary during a given day, and the magnitude of the IL-6 response to infection varies between different patients.
Speaking of limitations, the researchers say: “This study has inherent limitations. While the number of patients is more than three times that of previous similar studies in patients with medical conditions, the sample size remains small and lacks a replication cohort. “
“A more informed forecast could help determine when to scale up or down care, a key component of efficient resource allocation during the current pandemic. The score may also play a role in evaluating whether new therapies designed to decrease inflammation in COVID-19 provide benefits, “he adds.
The research was funded by the Elaine Galwey Research Fellowship, the American Thoracic Society, the National Institutes of Health, and the Parker B Francis Research Opportunity Award.
Main Image Credits: Jarun Ontakrai / Shutterstock
