London, Sep 21: The sound of cough could offer a quick, easy, and cost-effective method for identifying the severity of Covid-19 disease in patients, whether at home or in any healthcare setting, suggests a study.
While most individuals impacted by Covid-19 experience milder symptoms and recover within a few weeks, the global pandemic caused by the SARS-CoV-2 virus continues to pose a significant health challenge.
Some of those affected may progress to develop more severe illness and pneumonia, often resulting in a more unfavourable prognosis.
Although protocols have been developed to assess patients’ risk, diagnostic and prognostic tools primarily rely on expensive and less accessible imaging methods, such as radiography, ultrasound, or computed tomography (CT).
Therefore, there is a need to develop a simpler and more readily-available prognostic tool that enables healthcare providers to identify patients who have developed or are at risk of developing severe disease.
This would streamline patient triage and facilitate early intervention, even in home or primary care settings.
A team of Spanish researchers carried out a study based on the analysis and interpretation of cough sounds in the initial phases of Covid-19. This method is presented as a potential predictive, simple, and accessible tool to assess the risk of suffering severe pneumonia.
The research, published in the ‘European Respiratory Journal’, involved smart phone recordings of voluntary coughing sounds from 70 patients with SARS-CoV-2 infection, all recorded within the first 24 hours after their admission to the hospital.
Barcelona’s Institute for Bioengineering of Catalonia (IBEC) conducted an acoustic analysis of these recordings, which revealed significant differences in cough sounds depending on the severity of the respiratory condition, as previously confirmed by imaging tests and the need for supplemental oxygen.
The results indicate that this analysis could be used to categorise Covid patients as mild, moderate, or severe and to monitor patients with persistent Covid.