XORTX (XRTX) has shared studies from its article, “Prevalence and Outcomes Associated with Hyperuricemia in Hospitalized Patients with COVID-19”.
The results of the study were conducted by the Icahn School of Medicine with XORTX and focused on the clinical outcomes of 834 patients with COVID-19 infection.
The patients were sick with approximately 60 per cent developing acute kidney injury (AKI) and with 31.7 per cent dying in hospital.
The study investigated the potential predictive role of serum uric acid on clinical outcomes.
Serum uric acid was elevated in nearly 38 per cent of subjects when first measured.
The finding was an elevation in serum uric acid was found to be a major risk factor for AKI, major adverse kidney events and in-hospital mortality even after controlling for initial kidney function and other variables.
In addition, hyperuricemia was associated with higher procalcitonin and troponin levels.
The study contains several key findings that will help in understanding the acute injury occurring in hospitalized patients with accompanying COVID-19 infection.
This includes many individuals hospitalized with COVID-19 who arrive at the hospital develop acute kidney injury and high serum uric acid concentrations.
High serum uric acid is associated with increased biomarker indicators of kidney and heart injury and increased propensity toward sepsis.
Hyperuricemia has been associated with increased systemic and local inflammation.
In the setting of COVID-19 it may play a potential role in inflammation in kidney, heart and other organs.
Patients with hyperuricemia and COVID-19 have worse outcomes.
The authors of this paper and XORTX interpret these findings as one explanation of why individuals with obesity, diabetes and hyperuricemia are more at risk of increased harm due to COVID-19.
Building upon this data is a compelling rationale for physicians admitting COVID-19 patients to the hospital to test and characterize serum uric acid concentrations.
The findings also provide a strong incentive for clinical trial testing where the benefit of rapid and rigorous uric acid lowering in patients admitted to the hospital could demonstrate beneficial outcomes with respect to morbidity and mortality.
XORTX Therapeutics Inc. (XRTX) is up 3.04 per cent trading at $3.05 per share as of 1:25 p.m. EST.