Study design and participants
This is a retrospective observational multicentre study, encompassing two major COVID 19 ICU centres in London; including St Bartholomew’s Hospital and the Nightingale Hospital London which was the field hospital intensive care unit for COVID-19 during first wave of the pandemic. The study population comprised of consecutive patients (over the age of 18 years) admitted to COVID-19 intensive care units between 11th March and 05th May 2020 with definitive clinical outcome either discharge or death. 113 patients [St Bartholomew’s Hospital (73) and Nightingale Hospital (40)] were included fulfilling the above criteria, however 4 patients were excluded due to pre-existing diagnosis of permanent or persistent AF.
All patients had a laboratory confirmed diagnosis with detection of SARS-CoV-2 RNA on swab (nasal/throat) results. Demographic, clinical, laboratory and imaging data were extracted from the electronic medical records (Cerner Millennium- registered clinical portal of the institutions) and the details regarding premorbid conditions were also cross referenced with their respective general practitioner’s (GP) records.