May 19, 2020

Clinical Characteristics and Early Outcomes in Patients with COVID-19 Treated with Tocilizumab at a United States Academic Center

Category: Article Summary

Topic: Testing and Treatment

• The authors describe clinical outcomes for the first tocilizumab-treated cohort of 11 critically-ill patients with COVID-19 in the United States. Patients experienced mixed outcomes, highlighting the need for randomized trial data.
• Although C-reactive protein levels decreased in all patients following treatment (median211.6 mg/L pre-treatment vs. 19.7 mg/L at 5 days post-treatment), patients had higher IL-6 concentrations after tocilizumab treatment and no clinical improvement in fever or oxygen requirements. Among the 11 patients, 3 died, 6 remained in the intensive care unit, and 2 were discharged.

Rimland et al. (May19,2020). Clinical Characteristics and Early Outcomes in Patients with COVID-19 Treated with Tocilizumab at a United States Academic Center. Pre-print downloaded May 19 from https://doi.org/10.1101/2020.05.13.20100404