NATIONWIDE — The Journal of the American Medical Association has been continuing to roll with numerous studies on COVID-19 effects and treatments, recently discovering the benefits of corticosteroid drugs on critically-ill patients.

What You Need To Know

  • 1,703 critically-ill coronavirus patients across 5 continents over a 28-day period were studied

  • 678 patients received corticosteroids, of whom 222 died

  • 425 deaths out of 1,025 who received usual care or a placebo

  • Results found steroids reduce the mortality by at least 20 percent

The study focused on 1,703 critically-ill coronavirus patients across five continents over a 28-day period.

Among the 678 patients who received corticosteroids, there were 222 deaths in comparison to 425 deaths out of 1025 who received usual care or a placebo.

 “This corresponds to an absolute mortality risk of 32 percent with corticosteroids compared with an assumed mortality risk of 40 percent with usual care or placebo,” the study noted.

Researchers also followed adverse effects in patients across seven clinical trials. Only six reported serious adverse events, 64 of those occurring out of 354 patients taking the steroid. The occurrence increased in patients who were not receiving the drug, with 80 events reported out of the 342 placebo patients.

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Patients receiving different doses and kinds of steroids, including hydrocortisone and dexamethasone, still resulted in a lower mortality rate than those who were not receiving any steroids.

Overall, the study confirmed that treating critically-ill COVID-19 patients with corticosteroid drugs reduces the mortality by at least 20 percent.

According to Reuters, the findings reinforce results that were recognized as a major breakthrough announced in June, when dexamethasone became the first drug shown to be able to reduce death rates among severely sick COVID-19 patients. Dexamethasone has been highly used in intensive care units treating COVID-19 patients in numerous countries since then.

With the publication from JAMA being released Wednesday, the World Health Organization took notice and updated its information on COVID-19 treatments later that evening.

The guidance now recommends corticosteroids for severe COVID-19 patients and not in non-severe cases as adverse effects could be higher in those patients.