Abstract:
Background: after December 31, 2019 Covid-19 emerged in China, it caused more than 550
million cases and 6.3 million fatalities worldwide. The disease has incidence death rate 14.1
per 1000 person days of person. In most of the countries less than 20 days of median time to
death observed. Older age, presences of comorbidities are predictors of time to death.
Objective: To assess Time to Death and its Predictors among Covid-19 patients in West
Shoa Zone public hospitals, Oromia, Ethiopia from May 2020 to December 2022.
Methods: A hospital-based retrospective cohort study was done at West Shoa Public
Hospitals among 304 Covid-19 admitted patients from May 2020 to December 2022.
Consecutive sampling technique was used to extract patient data from patient chart and
entered to kobocollect tool, and analyzed using STATA version 14.0. Descriptive data were
presented in terms of frequency table, graph, and figures. The time until death was
determined using the median days. To calculate the survival probabilities, a Kaplan Meier
survival was used. The difference in survival curves between covariate categories was
compared using a Long-rank test. Cox-proportional hazard regression analysis was carried
out to identify independent predictors of time to death. Hazard ratios with their 95% CI and
p-value of <0.05 were computed
Results: From May 2020 to December 2022, 304 Covid-19 patients admitted to west Shoa
public hospitals were followed. The median time to death was 12.0 days. The overall
incidence death rate was 13.24 per 1000 person days. The participants' mean age was 50.26
50.26 ± 16.71 years. Men were 178 (58.16%), and the majority (167 (54.58%) lived in urban.
Being females were 70% protective (AHR=0.30 95%CI (0.11-0.79). Being late to visit health
facility after complaining any of symptoms (AHR=1.12(1.04-1.19), presence of more than
one comorbidity (AHR=7.58(2.73-21.08) were independent predictors of time to death.
Conclusion: The overall median time to death was 12.0 days with 13.24 per 1000 person
days. Our study found that being on invasive oxygen supplementation and delaying seeking
medical care, having the highest qSOFA score, being severe or critical, having one or more
underlying diseases, and being admitted to the intensive care unit were all substantially
related with early death from Covid-19 infection.
