WUHAN, CHINA — Chinese scientists have identified a pattern of day-to-day symptoms typical of patients with coronavirus in a new study.
The study, published in the journal JAMA, looked at 138 patients hospitalized with novel coronavirus-infected pneumonia at the Zhongnan Hospital of Wuhan University.
Fever is typically the first symptom experienced by those infected with SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes coronavirus disease 2019, according to the study of patients in Wuhan.
Some COVID-19 patients may also experience fatigue, muscle pain and a dry cough.
By day five, this transitions into breathing difficulties, especially for the elderly or those with preexisting health conditions.
The study found it took patients an average of seven days after running a fever before they were admitted to a hospital.
By day eight, those with severe symptoms had developed acute respiratory distress syndrome, or ARDS, which can be fatal.
This is when fluid builds up in the lungs.
Patients with worsening symptoms are typically admitted to the intensive care unit by day 10.
These patients are probably experiencing more abdominal pain and loss of appetite than those with milder symptoms. On average, it took patients with COVID-19 roughly two and a half weeks to recover from the illness and be discharged from the hospital.
According to CNN, as of March 19 there were 215,000 coronavirus cases globally.
The death toll has surpassed 8,000.
Countries such as Argentina, Canada and Taiwan as well as the European Union have shut their borders in order to slow the spread of the disease.
