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Accepted for/Published in: JMIR Public Health and Surveillance

Date Submitted: Apr 8, 2024
Open Peer Review Period: Apr 8, 2024 - Jun 3, 2024
Date Accepted: Aug 14, 2024
Date Submitted to PubMed: Aug 14, 2024
(closed for review but you can still tweet)

The final, peer-reviewed published version of this preprint can be found here:

Association Between Ursodeoxycholic Acid and Clinical Outcomes in Patients With COVID-19 Infection: Population-Based Cohort Study

Lee H, Kim MG, Yeom SW, Noh SJ, Jeong CY, Kim MJ, Kang MG, Ko JH, Park SC, Kweon HT, Sim SI, Lee H, You YS, Kim JS

Association Between Ursodeoxycholic Acid and Clinical Outcomes in Patients With COVID-19 Infection: Population-Based Cohort Study

JMIR Public Health Surveill 2024;10:e59274

DOI: 10.2196/59274

PMID: 39139026

PMCID: 11494262

Ursodeoxycholic acid is associated with better clinical outcomes in COVID-19 patients: A population-based cohort study

  • Hyunjun Lee; 
  • Min Gul Kim; 
  • Sang Woo Yeom; 
  • Sang Jae Noh; 
  • Cho Yun Jeong; 
  • Min Ji Kim; 
  • Min Gu Kang; 
  • Ji Hoon Ko; 
  • Su Cheol Park; 
  • Hyeok Tae Kweon; 
  • Sang Il Sim; 
  • Hyun Lee; 
  • Yeon Seok You; 
  • Jong Seung Kim

ABSTRACT

Background:

Several studies have investigated the relationship between ursodeoxycholic acid (UDCA) and coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19). However, complex and conflicting results have caused confusion in the application of these results.

Objective:

We aimed to investigate whether the association between UDCA and COVID can also be demonstrated through analysis of a large-scale cohort.

Methods:

This retrospective cohort study used internal and external validation cohorts: the Jeonbuk common data model (CDM) cohort (JBUH-CDM) and the Korean National Health Insurance claim-based database (NHIS), respectively. We investigated UDCA intake and its relationship with COVID-19 susceptibility and severity using validated propensity score (PS) matching.

Results:

Regarding the COVID-19 susceptibility UDCA intake is associated with being significantly lowered to 0.71 in JBUH-CDM (hazard ratio; HR) (95% confidence interval (CI): 0.52-0.98) value was significantly lowered to 0.93 (95% CI: 0.90-0.96) in the NHIS. Regarding the COVID-19 severity, UDCA intake was analyzed to be significantly lowered to 0.21 (95% CI: 0.09-0.46) in JBUH-CDM. It was also found that the HR value was significantly lowered to 0.77 in NHIS (95% CI: 0.62-0.95).

Conclusions:

Using a large-scale local cohort and an external validation cohort, we confirmed that UDCA intake was significantly associated with the reduction of COVID-19 susceptibility and severity. These trends remained consistent regardless of UDCA dosage. This suggests the potential of UDCA as a preventive and therapeutic agent for COVID-19.


 Citation

Please cite as:

Lee H, Kim MG, Yeom SW, Noh SJ, Jeong CY, Kim MJ, Kang MG, Ko JH, Park SC, Kweon HT, Sim SI, Lee H, You YS, Kim JS

Association Between Ursodeoxycholic Acid and Clinical Outcomes in Patients With COVID-19 Infection: Population-Based Cohort Study

JMIR Public Health Surveill 2024;10:e59274

DOI: 10.2196/59274

PMID: 39139026

PMCID: 11494262

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