Wang Q, Cheng J, Shang J, et al. - In coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) patients, disease aggravation and death could be effectively predicted by the combination of C reactive protein (CRP), neutrophil-to-lymphocyte ratio (NLR) and D-dimer. In severe COVID-19 cases, a strong inflammatory response and multiple adverse events might be suggested by the abnormal expression of these indicators.

• This is a retrospective cohort study of 638 patients with COVID-19, including severe and non-severe cases.

• Severe patients with adverse events had significantly higher CRP, NLR and D-dimer, vs patients with no adverse events.

• Multivariate logistic analysis showed CRP, NLR and D-dimer as independent risk factors for the disease progression of COVID-19.

• The model combining all of them offered an AUC (area under the receiver operating characteristic curve) of 0.894 and 0.918 predicting disease progression and death, respectively, which is the highest AUC generated.

• Shorter overall survival time was observed in patients with a high level of CRP, NLR or D-dimer.