Elsevier

Journal of Infection

Volume 81, Issue 1, July 2020, Pages e13-e20
Journal of Infection

Review
The effect of corticosteroid treatment on patients with coronavirus infection: a systematic review and meta-analysis

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jinf.2020.03.062Get rights and content

Highlights

  • Severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) threatens the health of people, and there is no proven pharmacological treatment.

  • Although corticosteroids were widely used during outbreaks of severe acute respiratory syndrome and Middle East respiratory syndrome, their efficacy remains highly controversial.

  • Patients with severe conditions are more likely to require corticosteroids. However, corticosteroid use may lead to increased mortality and serious adverse reactions.

  • Therefore, corticosteroids should be used with caution in the treatment of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19).

Abstract

Objectives

An outbreak of novel coronavirus in 2019 threatens the health of people, and there is no proven pharmacological treatment. Although corticosteroids were widely used during outbreaks of severe acute respiratory syndrome and Middle East respiratory syndrome, their efficacy remainedhighly controversial. We aimed to further evaluate the influence of corticosteroids on patients with coronavirus infection.

Methods

We conducted a comprehensive search of literature published in PubMed, Embase, Cochrane library, and China National Knowledge Infrastructure (CNKI) from January 1, 2002 to March 15, 2020. All statistical analyses in this study were performed on stata14.0.

Results

A total of 5270 patients from 15 studies were included in this meta-analysis. The result indicated that critical patients were more likely to require corticosteroids therapy (risk ratio [RR] = 1.56, 95% confidence interval [CI] = 1.28-1.90, P<0.001). However, corticosteroid treatment was associated with higher mortality (RR = 2.11, 95%CI = 1.13-3.94, P = 0.019), longer length of stay (weighted mean difference [WMD] = 6.31, 95%CI = 5.26–7.37, P<0.001), a higher rate of bacterial infection (RR = 2.08, 95%CI = 1.54–2.81, P<0.001), and hypokalemia (RR = 2.21, 95%CI = 1.07–4.55, P = 0.032) but not hyperglycemia (RR = 1.37, 95%CI=0.68–2.76, P = 0.376) or hypocalcemia (RR = 1.35, 95%CI = 0.77–2.37, P = 0.302).

Conclusions

Patients with severe conditions are more likely to require corticosteroids. Corticosteroid use is associated with increased mortality in patients with coronavirus pneumonia.

Keywords

Coronavirus
COVID-19
corticosteroid treatment
Meta-analysis

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1

The authors contributed equally to this work.

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