Abstract
Purpose
The COVID-19 pandemic poses new challenges for the medical
community due to its large number of patients presenting with varying
symptoms. Chest ultrasound (ChUS) may be particularly useful in the early
clinical management in suspected COVID-19 patients due to its broad
availability and rapid application. We aimed to investigate patterns of ChUS
in COVID-19 patients and compare the findings with results from chest X-ray
(CRX).
Materials and Methods
24 patients (18 symptomatic, 6 asymptomatic)
with confirmed SARS-CoV-2 by polymerase chain reaction underwent bedside
ChUS in addition to CRX following admission. Subsequently, the results of
ChUS and CRX were compared.
Results
94% (n=17/18) of patients with
respiratory symptoms demonstrated lung abnormalities on ChUS. ChUS was
especially useful to detect interstitial syndrome compared to CXR in
COVID-19 patients (17/18 vs. 11/18; p<0.02). Of
note, ChUS also detected lung consolidations very effectively (14/18
for ChUS vs. 7/18 cases for CXR; p<0.02). Besides
pathological B-lines and subpleural consolidations, pleural line abnormality
(89%; n=16/18) was the third most common feature in
patients with respiratory manifestations of COVID-19 detected by ChUS.
Conclusion
Our findings support the high value of ChUS in the
management of COVID-19 patients.
Key words
coronavirus - SARS-CoV-2 - COVID-19 - chest ultrasound - X-ray
