Abstract
Background Asthma is still considered a major chronic respiratory disease that afects a large number in the world.
The association between COVID-19 infection and asthma was studied in diferent ways focusing on hospital-admitted
patients. This study aimed to assess the outcome of patients with asthma and/or COVID infection in adults attending
outpatient pulmonary clinic over three successive months from clinical and laboratory point of view.
Patients and methods The current study was a retrospective observational study involving 898 patients attending the outpatient pulmonary clinic of a Saudi Arabian private hospital over three successive months from the 1st of
December 2020 to the end of February 2021. Patients were divided into three groups: group 1—COVID-19 infected
with asthma (312); group 2—COVID-19 infected with no asthma (286); and group 3—COVID-19 non-infected with
asthma (300).
Results and conclusions Results showed the best patient’s outcome was seen in asthmatic patients without COVID19 infection followed by asthmatic patient with COVID-19 infection. There was a signifcant statistical diference in
eosinophil count between COVID-19-infected patients with asthma and COVID-19 infected without asthma. Also, it
was shown that the most common cause of hospitalization in asthmatic patients with COVID-19 infection was pneumonia followed by gastroenteritis and not an asthma exacerbation.