Psychiatric Illness Is Linked to Increased Risk for Death with COVID-19

Psychiatric illness is associated with increased medical morbidity and higher mortality apart from the medical comorbidity. These researchers used administrative data from a U.S. hospital system to examine mortality in COVID-19 patients as a function of psychiatric illness.

Of 1685 patients hospitalized with COVID-19 in February, March, and April, 318 died by May. Overall, 473 (28%) had a psychiatric diagnosis before hospitalization. Having a psychiatric diagnosis was associated with greater odds of being female, older, and white and of having medical comorbidities. In unadjusted analyses, mortality in the psychiatric subgroup was 2.3 times higher than in the rest of the cohort. Rates at 2, 3, and 4 weeks were 36% vs. 15%; 41% vs. 22%; and 4…