Efficacy of blood urea nitrogen-to-albumin ratio for predicting prognostic outcomes of inpatients with COVID-19: A meta-analysis

Abstract

Background: The associations between blood urea nitrogen (BUN)/albumin ratio and poor prognosis in patients with diagnosis of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) remain to be clarified. Methods: A search based on 4 electronic databases (i.e., EMBASE, Google scholar, MEDLINE, and Cochrane Library) was performed on June 23, 2022. The association of BUN/Albumin ratio with poor prognostic outcomes, defined as patients with mortality/severe illnesses, were analyzed. Results: Results from analysis of 7 cohort studies (3600 individuals with COVID-19) published between 2020 and 2022 showed a higher BUN/Albumin ratio in the poor-prognosis group (Mean difference:  = 2.838, 95% confidence interval: 2.015–3.66, P < .001, I 2 = 92.5%) than the good-prognosis group. Additional investigation into the connection between BUN/Albumin ratio as a binary variable (i.e., high or low) and the risk of poor outcome also supported an association between a higher BUN/Albumin ratio and a poor prognostic risk (odd ratio = 3.009, 95% confidence interval: 1.565–5.783, P = .001, I 2 = 93.7%, 5 studies). Merged analysis of poor prognosis produced a sensitivity of 0.76, specificity of 0.72, and area under curve of 0.81. Conclusion: This meta-analysis demonstrated a positive correlation between BUN/albumin ratio and poor outcome in patients with COVID-19. Additional large-scale prospective studies are needed to verify our findings.