Creatinkinase und Myositis-Antikörper als Risikomarker für ungünstigen Verlauf bei Covid-19

SARS-CoV-2 infections push health systems worldwide beyond their limits.1 As many as 10% of patients are thought to suffer from a severe course of the disease. Older age and multimorbidity are associated with fatal courses. However, also younger, and otherwise healthy people may deteriorate. So far, no blood or other biomarkers that indicate a more severe course of Covid-19 have been identified.
We noticed significantly elevated values of the muscle enzyme creatine kinase (CK) in 62 of our currently 66 intensive care unit (ICU) Covid-19 patients. CK was either already high on admission or increased dramatically within the first few days (median peak-CK 1,065 U/L, range 175 – 12,141). Urine myoglobin reached values up to 1,990 µg/L.

Therefore consecutive laboratory analyses, ultrasound of heart and muscles, nerve conduction studies and electromyographies will be performed compared to other NON-Covid-19 ICU-treated patients.