PT  - JOURNAL ARTICLE
AU  - Michele Massimo Gulizia
AU  - Gianna Fabbri
AU  - Donata Lucci
AU  - Giuseppe Di Pasquale
AU  - Domenico Gabrielli
AU  - Jeness Campodonico
AU  - Andrea Mauro
AU  - Riccardo Inciardi
AU  - Emilio Di Lorenzo
AU  - Fabrizio Oliva
AU  - Federico Nardi
AU  - Furio Colivicchi
AU  - Leonardo De Luca
ED  - ,
TI  - Type of hospitalisations and in-hospital outcomes in the Italian coronary care unit network at the time of COVID-19 pandemic: the BLITZ-COVID19 Registry
AID  - 10.1136/bmjopen-2022-062382
DP  - 2022 Nov 01
TA  - BMJ Open
PG  - e062382
VI  - 12
IP  - 11
4099  - http://bmjopen.bmj.com/content/12/11/e062382.short
4100  - http://bmjopen.bmj.com/content/12/11/e062382.full
SO  - BMJ Open2022 Nov 01; 12
AB  - Objective The aim of the study was to describe the epidemiology and outcome of patients hospitalised during the COVID-19 pandemic in intensive cardiac care units (ICCs).Design Non-interventional, retrospective and prospective, nationwide study.Setting 109 private or public ICCs in Italy.Participants 6054 consecutive patients admitted to Italian ICCs during COVID-19 pandemic.Primary and secondary outcome measures To obtain accurate and up-to-date information on epidemiology and outcome of patients admitted to ICCs during the COVID-19 pandemic, the impact that the COVID-19 infection may have determined on the organisational pathways and in-hospital management of the various clinical conditions being admitted to ICCs.Results Acute coronary syndromes were the most frequent ICC discharge diagnoses followed by heart failure and hypokinetic arrhythmias. The prevalence of COVID-19 positivity was approximately 3%. Most patients with a COVID-19 diagnosis at discharge (52%) arrived to ICC from other wards, in particular 22% from non-cardiology ICCs. The overall mortality was 4.2% during ICC and 5.8% during hospital stay. The cause of in-hospital death was cardiac in 74.4% of the cases, non-cardiovascular in 13.5%, vascular in 5.8% and related to COVID-19 in 6.3% of the patients.Conclusions This study provides a unique nationwide picture of current ICC care during COVID-19 pandemic.Trial registration number NCT04744415.The dataset used in this study is not publicly available, but it can be provided on reasonable request after the approval of the Steering Committee of the study.