Alteration of Ferritin Levels and Lymphocytes Counts in Saudi Patients with COVID-19 Infection in Al Madinah Al Munawarah

It is an essential to evaluate the potential biomarkers affecting the progression of disease in COVID-19 patients. Therefore, we investigated the relationship between Ferritin levels and hematological parameters and severity of COVID-19 to explore its role in predicting the severity of COVID-19. This retrospective study was conducted in different Hospitals at Madinah region, Saudi Arabia. In the present study, a total of 112 cases of COVID-19 patients. The patient records included the clinical and laboratory data that was used for analysis by using the GraphPad Prism Software. Data presented as mean (SD), all differences were statistically significant at the level of P≤0.05 or ≤0.001. There were significantly increased levels of ferritin, neutrophil and leukocyte counts in severe COVID-19 cases (1857 (50.9), 9.9 (2.8), 9.9 (2.8) respectively) compared with non-sever cases. Additionally, there were significantly reduction in lymphocytes counts in COVID-19 patients (1.3 (9.5), P=0.001). There were also strong correlations between elevation of ferritin levels or reduction of lymphocytes and the severity COVID-19 infection (r=0.53, OR: 5.88 and r=-0.55, OR: 3.98 respectively). The results demonstrate that high values for neutrophil, leukocyte counts and Ferritin levels, and low values for lymphocyte counts may have diagnostic properties concerning COVID-19 in severe cases.