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Category: Volume 08 Issue 07 July 2020
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Title: Use of Insulin in treatment of COVID-19: A proposal to explore feasibility

Authors: Dr Jayesh G Kalbhande, Dr Vicky Kuldeep

 DOI: https://dx.doi.org/10.18535/jmscr/v8i7.103

Abstract

Introduction

It was December 2019, first case of Corona Virus Disease 2019 viz. Covid-19 was reported in Wuhan, China.(1) Initially the Chinese Centre of Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) named it as Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome Coronavirus 2 which was later labelled as COVID-19 by WHO on February 11, 2020.(2) Soon COVID-19 was declared as Pandemic by WHO. COVID-19 symptoms include fever, dry cough, muscle pain, diarrhoea, fatigue, loss of smell and taste. It has been found that it can lead to sudden and rapid deterioration in general condition resulting in respiratory failure and septic shock in severe cases.(3)

COVID 19 has a major impact in European countries and in United States of America. Presently there are more than 15 million cases worldwide with a death toll of more than0.6 million.(4) Currently the number of COVID 19 positive cases is rapidly rising in India. As of today, there is no curative medication for COVID 19.Patients with mild symptoms recovers with supportive medication. Patients with moderate to severe symptoms, especially the elderly or with comorbidities may develop severe COVID 19. They are currently treated with number of experimental and repurposed medications. These patients may have high mortality rates.(5) We scrolled through the literature to analyse the role of Insulin in the treatment of COVID-19.

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Corresponding Author

Dr Jayesh G Kalbhande

Consultant Surgeon, BARC Hospital