Acta clinica Croatica, Vol. 64. No. 1, 2025.
Original scientific paper
https://doi.org/10.20471/acc.2025.64.01.08
Factors Associated with COVID-19 Related Death in 2020 in Croatia: a Nationwide Observational Cohort Study
Sanja Musić Milanović
; School of Medicine, University of Zagreb, Zagreb, Croatia; Croatian Institute of Public Health, Zagreb, Croatia
Tin Orešković
; Big Data Institute, Li Ka Shing Centre for Health Information and Discovery, University of Oxford, United Kingdom
Helena Križan
orcid.org/0000-0001-8429-8657
; Croatian Institute of Public Health, Zagreb, Croatia
*
Adriana Vince
orcid.org/0000-0003-2355-6573
; University Hospital for Infectious Diseases, Zagreb, Croatia
* Corresponding author.
Abstract
The coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) caused by the severe acute respiratory
syndrome coronavirus (SARS-CoV-2) has had a global effect on mortality. Many attempts were made
to identify those at the highest risk of death if infected with SARS-CoV-2, yet the relative importance
and global generalizability of individual risk factors remain unclear. At the Croatian Institute of Public
Health, electronic health data from multiple databases were combined to examine factors associated
with COVID-19 related death. Data on 212 615 patients confir med to have COVID-19 by a positive
RT-PCR in 2020 were pseudonymously linked to hospital records and 16 150 hospitalized patients were
identified. Apart from older age and male sex, major factors associated with an increased rate of mortality
among patients hospitalized with COVID-19 were cardiovascular diseases (adjusted HR: 1.20; 95% CI
1.12-1.28); diabetes (adjusted HR: 1.17; 95% CI 1.09-1.25); and chronic lower respiratory diseases (adjusted
HR: 1.10; 95% CI 1.02-1.18). This Croatian study used primary care and hospital data to establish
factors associated with COVID-19 related death among patients hospitalized with COVID-19. The
results of this study provide rigorous evaluation of the previously defined risk factors and offer guidance
for further studies that will create prognostic models based on empirical data from 2020.
Keywords
Epidemiology; Health policy; SARS-CoV-2; Virus diseases
Hrčak ID:
335503
URI
Publication date:
31.3.2025.
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