COVID-19 presenting as acute pancreatitis
Coronavirus disease-2019 (COVID-19) pandemic has spread over 200 countries worldwide, affecting more than 2 million people and more than 120,000 deaths. Gastrointestinal manifestations of COVID-19 have been recognized. Mark M. Aloysius and colleague published a paper in Pancreatology journal under the title “COVID-19 presenting as acute pancreatitis”. The summary of this paper is given below:
Objective:
To report a case of COVID-19 with acute pancreatitis (AP) without any other risk factors.
Method:
Symptoms, physical and laboratory examination of a 36-year-old obese Hispanic female was recorded. The patient was diagnosed with severe acute pancreatitis with ARDS. While treatment for the possibility of bacterial pneumonia was initiated, nasal swab for SARS-CoV-2 reverse transcriptase-polymerase chain reaction (RT-PCR) was found to be positive later. Oxygen requirements declined over the next two weeks.
Findings:
While the study didn’t find direct evidence of viral pancreatitis, lack of other causes and the temporal relationship between pancreatitis and COVID-19 suggests coronavirus-induced pancreatitis. Clear pathogenesis for AP caused by SARS-CoV-2 is unknown. On the other hand, AP in COVID19 patients could occur directly due to the cytopathic effect of local SARS-CoV-2 replication or indirectly by harmful immune response induced by the virus.
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