Correlation Between Heart Fatty Acid Binding Protein And Severe Covid-19: A Case-Control Study

BackgroundHeart-fatty acid binding protein (HFABP) has been recognized as a highly heart-specific marker. However, it is currently unknown that its HFABP is also closely related to the severity of COVID-19.MethodsWe retrospectively screened 46 patients who met our inclusion criteria within 4 weeks. They were tested for HFABP after the diagnosis of COVID-19, and monitored for HFABP during their hospital stay. We tracked the patients during their hospital stay to determine if they had severe COVID-19 or mild-to-severe transition features. We calculated the chi-square test values found for HFABP to predict the correlation between HFABP levels and the severity of the COVID-19.ResultsOf these 46 cases, 16 cases with confirmed COVID-19 were tested for HFABP> 7 ng / mL upon admission; among them, 14 cases were diagnosed with severe COVID-19 within the hospitalization. The Odds ratio of the measured HFABP elevation was 6.81(95% confidence interval [CI] 5.23-8.40), and 3 patients with severe COVID-19 progressed in 5 patients with mild HFABP> 7 ng/mL.ConclusionThese data indicate that the elevation of HFABP is closely related to the severity of COVID-19 in the patients, and the elevated HFABP may cause rapid development of patients with mild COVID-19 into severe COVID-19. But serum HFABP negative maybe make patients with mild COVID-19 safer, the current data show no effect on the all-cause mortality.