Nasopharyngeal Microbiota As an Early Severity Biomarker in COVID-19 Hospitalised Patients

Overview

Journal J Infect

Specialty Infectious Diseases

Date 2021 Dec 29

PMID 34963638

Citations 7

Authors

Maria Paz Ventero

Oscar Moreno-Perez

Carmen Molina-Pardines

Andreu Paytuvi-Gallart

Vicente Boix

Isabel Escribano

Irene Galan

Pilar Gonzalez-delaAleja

Mario Lopez-Perez

Rosario Sanchez-Martinez

Esperanza Merino

Juan Carlos Rodriguez

Affiliations

Soon will be listed here.

Abstract

This study aimed to analyse the diversity and taxonomic composition of the nasopharyngeal microbiota, to determine its association with COVID-19 clinical outcome. To study the microbiota, we utilized 16S rRNA sequencing of 177 samples that came from a retrospective cohort of COVID-19 hospitalized patients. Raw sequences were processed by QIIME2. The associations between microbiota, invasive mechanical ventilation (IMV), and all-cause mortality were analysed by multiple logistic regression, adjusted for age, gender, and comorbidity. The microbiota α diversity indexes were lower in patients with a fatal outcome, whereas the β diversity analysis showed a significant clustering in these patients. After multivariate adjustment, the presence of Selenomonas spp., Filifactor spp., Actinobacillus spp., or Chroococcidiopsis spp., was associated with a reduction of more than 90% of IMV. Higher diversity and the presence of certain genera in the nasopharyngeal microbiota seem to be early biomarkers of a favourable clinical evolution in hospitalized COVID-19 patients.

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