Letter to the Editor
Copyright ©The Author(s) 2021. Published by Baishideng Publishing Group Inc. All rights reserved.
World J Gastroenterol. Jul 14, 2021; 27(26): 4248-4251
Published online Jul 14, 2021. doi: 10.3748/wjg.v27.i26.4248
Impact of COVID-19 on the clinical status of patients with Wilson disease
Yu-Pei Zhuang, Hao-Jie Zhong
Yu-Pei Zhuang, Hao-Jie Zhong, Department of Gastroenterology, The First Affiliated Hospital of Guangdong Pharmaceutical University, Guangzhou 510080, Guangdong Province, China
Hao-Jie Zhong, School of Biology and Biological Engineering, South China University of Technology, Guangzhou 510000, Guangdong Province, China
Hao-Jie Zhong, Institute of Microbiology, Guangdong Academy of Sciences, Guangzhou 510000, Guangdong Province, China
Author contributions: Zhong HJ designed the research; Zhuang YP analyzed the data; Zhuang YP and Zhong HJ performed the research and wrote the letter.
Conflict-of-interest statement: The authors declare no conflicts of interest for this article.
Open-Access: This article is an open-access article that was selected by an in-house editor and fully peer-reviewed by external reviewers. It is distributed in accordance with the Creative Commons Attribution NonCommercial (CC BY-NC 4.0) license, which permits others to distribute, remix, adapt, build upon this work non-commercially, and license their derivative works on different terms, provided the original work is properly cited and the use is non-commercial. See: http://creativecommons.org/Licenses/by-nc/4.0/
Corresponding author: Hao-Jie Zhong, MD, PhD, Doctor, Department of Gastroenterology, The First Affiliated Hospital of Guangdong Pharmaceutical University, No. 19 Nonglingxia Road, Guangzhou 510080, Guangdong Province, China. jaxzhong@126.com
Received: April 10, 2021
Peer-review started: April 10, 2021
First decision: May 24, 2021
Revised: June 3, 2021
Accepted: June 16, 2021
Article in press: June 16, 2021
Published online: July 14, 2021
Processing time: 92 Days and 23.9 Hours
Abstract

The coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic has greatly impacted health systems. Many guidelines on chronic liver diseases have been released to optimize the use of medical resources and patient management. However, most of these guidelines have been established through expert consensus because the existing data do not provide strong evidence for developing effective recommendations. As Wilson disease (WD) is a rare chronic liver disease, the impact of COVID-19 on the clinical status of patients with WD is unclear. The present study showed a marked shortage of medical resources for clinically managing patients with WD during the pandemic. Although patients with WD who consistently took anticopper therapy showed no significant differences in hepatic and extrahepatic markers before and after the pandemic, their complication incidences, especially the infection incidence, were significantly increased during the study period. Therefore, patients with WD should be encouraged to adhere to anticopper therapy and be closely monitored to prevent infections and other complications. The present study provides a clinical basis for further managing WD during the pandemic.

Keywords: Coronavirus disease 2019; Wilson disease; Clinical status; Complications; Infections; Anticopper therapy

Core Tip: The coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic has had a long-lasting impact on the quality of care for patients with cirrhosis. Although many guidelines have been released for the rational use of medical resources, few clinical data are available to support these guidelines. The clinical features of patients with Wilson disease during the COVID-19 pandemic remain unclear. We compared the clinical features of patients with Wilson disease before and after the pandemic to clarify the impact of COVID-19 on these patients and provide a basis for their clinical management.