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. 2022 Oct 8;72:154162. doi: 10.1016/j.jcrc.2022.154162

Table 2.

Patient's treatment.

BMI > 30 (n = 171) BMI ≤ 30 (n = 121) P-value
Treatment of COVID-19
- Low dose corticosteroids (up to 8 mg dexamethasone/day) 71.3% (122) 81.8% (99) 0.04
- High dose corticosteroids (>8 mg dexamethasone or >40 mg methylprednisolone/day) 28.1% (48) 6.6% (8) <0.001
- Isoprinosine 70.8% (121) 67.8% (82) 0.584
- Remdesivir 41.5% (71) 61.2% (74) <0.001
- Monoclonal antibodies⁎ 9.4% (16) 19% (23) 0.018
- Baricitinib 2.9% (5) 5% (6) 0.368
- Tocilizumab 1.2% (2) 1.7% (2) 0.726
NIV/HFNO (days) 2 (1–4) 2 (0–5) 0.702
Tracheostomy 75.4% (129) 69.4% (84) 0.254
Intubation to tracheostomy interval (days) 8 (5–9) 7 (6–9) 0.552
Initiation of PSV post intubation (days) 5.5 (3–9) 5 (2–7) 0.023
Prone position 62% (106) 59.5% (72) 0.623
VV ECMO 45% (77) 34.7% (42) 0.087
  • -

    ECMO drainage cannula (F)

 29 (25–29) 27 (25–29) 0.503
  • -

    ECMO return cannula (F)

 23 (21−23) 23 (21–23) 0.726
  • -

    Initial blood flow (l/min)

 4.7 (4.2–5.2) 4.6 (4.2–5) 0.631
  • -

    Initial sweep gas flow (l/min)

 3 (2.5–4) 3 (2.5–3.5) 0.459
ECMO retrieval 34.5% (59) 23.1% (28) 0.85
  • -

    Interval from ICU admission to ECMO cannulation (days)

 5 (2–9) 7 (4–10) 0.021
ECMO duration (days) 14 (8–24) 14 (9–23) 0.775
  • -

    successful ECMO weaning

 62.3% (48) 59.5% (25) 0.845
circuit thrombosis 3.5% (6) 0 0.519
number of circuits used 2 (1–3) 2 (1–2) 0.570
duration of MV or NIV prior to ECMO initiation (days) 3 (1–5) 2 (1–4) 0.201
prone on ECMO 30.7% (23) 28.6% (12) 0.837
  • -

    duration of MV after ECMO explantation

 6 (5–13) 7 (3−10) 0.447

Table 2: Comparison of therapy in the obese versus non-obese groups (numbers and percentages or medians with interquartile ranges, compared with Mann-Whitney U or the Fischer's exact tests).

⁎

Monoclonal antibodies available since 2021; NIV, noninvasive ventilation; HFNO, high flow nasal oxygen; PSV, pressure support ventilation; MV, mechanical ventilation; circuit thrombosis = pump head thrombosis requiring urgent resetting. Interval from ICU admission to ECMO starts at the referring hospital ICU admission. Initial fraction of oxygen on the ECMO blender (FsO2) was 100% in all patients.