Oral manifestation in patients with COVID-19 hospitalized in Intensive Care Unit

Abstract

PURPOSE: to point out the relationship between Sars-CoV-2 (COVID-19) and the prevalent oral manifestations associated with the disease, whose computed numbers show an increasing trend, although these manifestations remain with their etiopathology imprecise. METHODS: an Intensive Care Unit of a public hospital in Brasília, Federal District, was used as a research environment, through a retrospective analysis of data from patients hospitalized there from March 2019 to March 2021, verifying the prevalence of oral lesions between two groups of patients hospitalized under invasive mechanical ventilation: patients diagnosed with COVID-19 and patients with other comorbidities. RESULTS: after statistical analysis using Chi-Square or Fisher's exact tests, of the 294 medical records evaluated, 147 were from patients with COVID-19, and from this group, 56.6% developed some oral manifestation. Among them, there was a higher prevalence of herpetic lesions (14.3%) combined with sialorrhea (11.6%) in patients with COVID-19 compared to the other study group. CONCLUSION: it is considered that there is a need to carry out more scientific studies on the subject in order to elucidate the real intraoral impact of COVID-19 in critically ill patients.