Objective: The present study aims to compare the clinical and laboratory characteristics of patients diagnosed with coro-navirus disease (COVID-19) using Real-Time Reverse Transcriptase Polymerase Chain Reaction (RT-PCR) and Computed Tomography (CT).
Materials and Methods: In this study, 240 adult patients were included. The demographic data, symptoms, COVID-19 findings in the initial pulmonary CT during admission and the first laboratory parameters were recorded. The patients were divided into three groups as Group 1 consisting of 100 PCR (+) CT (+) patients, Group 2 consisting of 40 PCR (+) CT (-) patients, Group 3 consisting of 100 PCR (-) CT (+) patients.
Results: The mean symptom duration was 5.78 days in Group 1, 2.67 days in Group 2, and 5.26 days in Group 3 (p<0.05). The mean symptom duration was 5.52 days in CT (+) patients and 2.67 days in CT (-) patients (p<0.05). The findings showed that one unit increase in pathological lobe count decreased PCR positivity by 1.3 times (p=0.002).
Conclusion: There may not be any findings in CT in the first 48-72 hours after the onset of the symptoms in symptomatic patients, and as the number of pathological pulmonary lobes detected in CT increases, PCR positivity decreases.