ISSN: 2578-482X
Authors: Giovanni Montealegre Gomez, Alejandra Garcia Botero, Jorge Ernesto Cantini, Carlos EduardoTorres, Susana Correa, Edgar Alfonso Penaranda and Viviana Gomez Ortega*
This work presents the theoretical basis for the use of Colchicine in the prevention of Acute Respiratory Distress Syndrome (ARDS) associated with COVID-19 infection. Several reports show that the common final event that increases mortality from COVID-19 infection is ARDS, which occurs due to an unmodulated inflammatory response, which leads to respiratory failure and death. For many years we have used colchicine, anti-inflammatory and antimitotic, for the management of symptoms associated with modeling disease, iatrogenic allogenosis, or Schoenfeld’s syndrome, obtaining control of the inflammatory or autoimmune process that occurred in these patients. Colchicine is an alkaloid extracted from the plant "Genus Colchicum" and works by modulating the inflammatory response in patients with gout, gouty arthritis and familial Mediterranean fever. We observed that a group of patients consuming colchicine, 5 patients, diagnosed with COVID-19 infection and within the age group with the highest risk, presented only minor symptoms and did not develop ARDS. This clinical observation motivates us to present a novel management proposal for the prevention of ARDS associated with COVID-19 infection. This paper displays the theoretical basis and a management proposal through the early detection of patients who may have ARDS, using Colchicine with an initial dose similar to that used to control acute gout attacks and a maintenance dose for 2 to 3 weeks. The adverse effects of using this medicine can be managed simultaneously. Early detection of patients who may have ARDS and the use of colchicine, a very low-cost drug, in these patients may decrease the mortality associated with COVID-19 infection.
Keywords: Colchicine; Acute Respiratory Distress; Inflammatory; Cytokines; Covid-19; Mortality
