Hemorrhage, Disseminated Intravascular Coagulopathy, and Thrombosis Complications Among Critically Ill Patients with COVID-19: An International COVID-19 Critical Care Consortium Study.

Objectives: To determine the prevalence and outcomes associated with hemorrhage, disseminated intravascular coagulopathy, and thrombosis (HECTOR) complications in ICU patients with COVID-19.
Design: Prospective, observational study.
Setting: Two hundred twenty-nine ICUs across 32 countries.
Patients: Adult patients (≥ 16 yr) admitted to participating ICUs for severe COVID-19 from January 1, 2020, to December 31, 2021.
Interventions: None.
Measurements and Main Results: HECTOR complications occurred in 1,732 of 11,969 study eligible patients (14%). Acute thrombosis occurred in 1,249 patients (10%), including 712 (57%) with pulmonary embolism, 413 (33%) with myocardial ischemia, 93 (7.4%) with deep vein thrombosis, and 49 (3.9%) with ischemic strokes. Hemorrhagic complications were reported in 579 patients (4.8%), including 276 (48%) with gastrointestinal hemorrhage, 83 (14%) with hemorrhagic stroke, 77 (13%) with pulmonary hemorrhage, and 68 (12%) with hemorrhage associated with extracorporeal membrane oxygenation (ECMO) cannula site. Disseminated intravascular coagulation occurred in 11 patients (0.09%). Univariate analysis showed that diabetes, cardiac and kidney diseases, and ECMO use were risk factors for HECTOR. Among survivors, ICU stay was longer (median days 19 vs 12; p < 0.001) for patients with versus without HECTOR, but the hazard of ICU mortality was similar (hazard ratio [HR] 1.01; 95% CI 0.92-1.12; p = 0.784) overall, although this hazard was identified when non-ECMO patients were considered (HR 1.13; 95% CI 1.02-1.25; p = 0.015). Hemorrhagic complications were associated with an increased hazard of ICU mortality compared to patients without HECTOR complications (HR 1.26; 95% CI 1.09-1.45; p = 0.002), whereas thrombosis complications were associated with reduced hazard (HR 0.88; 95% CI 0.79-0.99, p = 0.03).
Conclusions: HECTOR events are frequent complications of severe COVID-19 in ICU patients. Patients receiving ECMO are at particular risk of hemorrhagic complications. Hemorrhagic, but not thrombotic complications, are associated with increased ICU mortality.
Competing Interests: Dr. J. P. Fanning received funding from the Australian-American Fulbright Commission and Metro North Clinical Research Fellowship, Queensland Government, Australia. Drs. Suen, Li Bassi, and Fraser received support for article research from the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. Dr. Cho is funded by National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute 1K23HL157610. Dr. Rando received funding from the American Heart Association. Dr. Whitman disclosed that he is 50% owner of a patent for a medical device for GWBN, LLC and that he received funding from Cellphire/Avania as principal investigator for a national study. Dr. Arora received funding from Edwards LifeSciences and Avir Pharma. Dr. Grasselli received funding from Getinge, Fisher & Paykel, Draeger Medical, Merck Sharp and Dohme, Cook Medical, and GlaxoSmithKline. Dr. Usman received support for article research from the National Institutes of Health. Drs. Suen’s and Li Bassi’s institutions received funding from The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. Dr. Suen is funded by the Advance Queensland fellowship program, Queensland Government, Australia. Dr. Li Bassi’s institution received funding from Fisher & Paykel. Dr. Li Bassi is a recipient of the Biomedical international training research programme for excellent clinician-scientists (BITRECS) fellowship; the “BITRECS” project has received funding from the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation program under the Marie Skłodowska-Curie grant agreement no. 754550 and from the “La Caixa” Foundation (ID 100010434), under the agreement LCF/PR/GN18/50310006. Dr. Dalton received funding from extracorporeal membrane oxygenation concepts, entegrion, and hemocue. The remaining authors have disclosed that they do not have any potential conflicts of interest.
(Copyright © 2023 The Author(s). Published by Wolters Kluwer Health, Inc. on behalf of the Society of Critical Care Medicine and Wolters Kluwer Health, Inc.)