Pathological Features of Lung in COVID-19 Disease Subjects: A Postmortem Study

Introduction: The current Coronavirus Disease-19 (COVID-19) pandemic is considered as one of the most serious public health crises which caused more than 1.62 million deaths from October 2020 to November 2020. Acute respiratory failure is leading cause of death followed by sepsis, cardiac failure and haemorrhage. Since the pathological findings are diverse in COVID-19 and majority of studies in literature were by open autopsy; the present study was done using percutaneous core needle biopsy. Postmortem lung biopsies are rather easy and quick to perform and decrease the infective risk caused by full autopsies. This could be an essential tool for diagnosis, surveillance and research.

Aim: To study the pathological features of lung in COVID-19 deceased patients by postmortem.

Materials and Methods: This cross-sectional study was conducted in the Department of Pulmonary Medicine, Dr. Pinnamaneni Siddhartha Institute of Medical Sciences and Research Foundation, Vijayawada, Andhra Pradesh, India from October 2020 to November 2020. In present study, postmortem percutaneous core needle biopsies from lung were performed within two hours of death from eight deceased patients who died of COVID-19. Clinical history, inflammatory markers and treatment details were collected from case sheets, biopsy was done, specimen was collected and sent for pathological examination. Data was presented in the descriptive form for each variable.

Results: Out of eight cases, five were men and three were women with a mean age of 54.12 years. Majority of patients presented with complaints of shortness of breath and fever. Hypertension, type 2 diabetes mellitus, obesity, hypothyroidism, history of pulmonary tuberculosis were the co-morbidities noticed. Four biopsies presented acute lung injury with hyaline membrane changes, Diffuse Alveolar Damage (DAD) with hyaline membrane was seen in two cases, squamous metaplasia was seen in two cases and acute lung injury with organising pneumonia was seen in two cases.

Conclusion: Postmortem lung biopsies are safe, easy to perform and provide insights of possible undergoing pathology of the disease with regard to clinical presentation.