Diagnosis of coronavirus by measuring serum concentrations of IL-6 and blood ferritin

Aims:The purpose of this study is to explore changes of pathogenesis markers in peripheral blood of severe COVID-19 patients, which may be of value in disease monitoring. Methods: In this case-control study, we collected data of 180 subjects in two groups including 137 patients with COVID-19 (case) and 43 with non-COVID-19 (control) between March 20 and May 21, 2020, and the clinical characteristics and inflammatory markers of patients diagnosed by laboratory test.The data were analyzed by SPSS software version 20. Results: The enrolled COVID-19 patients consisted of 59.9% males and 40.1% females with the medium age of 45.96±18.49 years and there were 48.8% males and 51.2% females with the medium age of 43.23±18.30 years for non COVID-19 patients. There wasn’t significant difference in the ages and sex between two groups. The frequency of positive RT-PCR test for case and control groups were 87.6% and 2.3%, respectively. A high statistically significant in means count of IL-6 and Ferritin and hematological parameters in different groups of patients with COVID-19 and non- COVID-19 were shown in this study. There was a direct positively correlated between serum level of IL-6 and Ferritin levels and hematological parameters, such as WBC, Hb and etc. with COVID-19 Conclusions: In conclusion, inflammatory markers especially IL-6 and Ferritin and hematological parameters (WBC, Lymphocytes, Neutrophils, Platelet and Hb) were positively correlated with the severity of COVID-19.Measurement of IL-6, Ferritin and hematological indices might be workable tests to monitor and evaluate the severity and prognosis of patients with COVID-19