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Psychiatric disorders during acute hospital treatment of COVID-19 - a case series

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  13 August 2021

L.A. Fernandes*
Affiliation:
Mental Health Department, Hospital Prof. Doutor Fernando Fonseca EPE, Amadora, Portugal
C. Ribeiro
Affiliation:
Child And Adolescent Psychiatry Mental Health Department, Hospital de Dona Estefânia, Centro Hospitalar Universitário de Lisboa Central, Lisboa, Portugal
M. Martins
Affiliation:
Psychiatry Department, Hospital Distrital de Santarém, EPE, Santarém, Portugal
J. Carreno
Affiliation:
Agrupamento De Centros De Saúde Sintra, Unidade de Saúde Familiar Monte da Luz, Queluz, Portugal
I. Guerra
Affiliation:
Agrupamento De Centros De Saúde Sintra, Unidade de Saúde Familiar Mactamã, Queluz, Portugal
C. Oliveira
Affiliation:
Mental Health Department, Hospital Prof. Doutor Fernando Fonseca EPE, Amadora, Portugal
C. Vieira
Affiliation:
Mental Health Department, Hospital Prof. Doutor Fernando Fonseca EPE, Amadora, Portugal
A. Luís
Affiliation:
Mental Health Department, Hospital Prof. Doutor Fernando Fonseca EPE, Amadora, Portugal
T. Maia
Affiliation:
Mental Health Department, Hospital Prof. Doutor Fernando Fonseca EPE, Amadora, Portugal
*
*Corresponding author.

Abstract

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Introduction

Coronavirus disease (COVID-19) has been associated with the development mental and behavioural symptoms and psychiatric disorders. This association is stronger in severe cases of the disease and in those needing inpatient treatment, particularly in intensive care units (ICU).

Objectives

To determine the incidence of psychiatric disorders in a Portuguese hospital-based sample of patients with COVID-19. To describe relevant demographic and clinical data.

Methods

We reviewed all COVID-19 inpatients assessed by liaison psychiatry at our hospital between April and September 2020. Patients admitted due to a psychiatric disorder were excluded from the analysis. We reviewed medical records and retrieved relevant clinical data. ICD-10 was used to classify diagnoses.

Results

We identified 36 cases with a mean age of 62.64 years-old (SD 19.23). The most common disorder was delirium, which occurred in 41.7% of our sample (15 patients), followed by adjustment disorder (22.2%, n=8), and depressive episode (16.7%, n=8). Most patients had no personal (61.1%, n=22) nor family (75%, n=27) history of a psychiatric disorder. Mean length of admission was 36.89 days (SD 28.91). Seventeen cases (47.22%) had at least one risk factor for severe COVID-19 disease and 14 (38.89%) were admitted at some point to the ICU.

Conclusions

In our sample, delirium was the main cause for mental or behavioural symptoms in COVID-19 patients. However, we observed a wide array of presentations in our center. A larger sample would allow to better characterize this often-overlooked symptoms and identify risk factors to psychiatric syndromes.

Disclosure

No significant relationships.

Type
Abstract
Creative Commons
Creative Common License - CCCreative Common License - BY
This is an Open Access article, distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution licence (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits unrestricted re-use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.
Copyright
© The Author(s), 2021. Published by Cambridge University Press on behalf of the European Psychiatric Association
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