Observational Study
Copyright ©The Author(s) 2022. Published by Baishideng Publishing Group Inc. All rights reserved.
World J Gastroenterol. Nov 28, 2022; 28(44): 6282-6293
Published online Nov 28, 2022. doi: 10.3748/wjg.v28.i44.6282
Virological and histological evaluation of intestinal samples in COVID-19 patients
Dajana Cuicchi, Liliana Gabrielli, Maria Lucia Tardio, Giada Rossini, Antonietta D’Errico, Pierluigi Viale, Tiziana Lazzarotto, Gilberto Poggioli
Dajana Cuicchi, Gilberto Poggioli, Department of Medical and Surgical Sciences, Surgery of the Alimentary Tract, IRCCS Azienda Ospedaliero-Universitaria di Bologna, Bologna 40138, Italy
Liliana Gabrielli, Giada Rossini, Tiziana Lazzarotto, Department of Experimental, Diagnostic and Specialty Medicine, Microbiology Unit, IRCCS Azienda Ospedaliero-Universitaria di Bologna, Bologna 40138, Italy
Maria Lucia Tardio, Antonietta D’Errico, Department of Experimental, Diagnostic and Specialty Medicine, Pathology Unit, IRCCS Azienda Ospedaliero-Universitaria di Bologna, Bologna 40138, Italy
Pierluigi Viale, Department for Integrated Infectious Risk Management, Infectious Diseases Unit, IRCCS Azienda Ospedaliero-Universitaria di Bologna, Bologna 40138, Italy
Pierluigi Viale, Infectious Diseases Unit, Department for Integrated Infectious Risk Management, University of Bologna, Bologna 40138, Italy
Tiziana Lazzarotto, Section of Microbiology, Department of Experimental, Diagnostic and Specialty Medicine, University of Bologna, Bologna 40138, Italy
Gilberto Poggioli, Department of Medical and Surgical Sciences, University of Bologna, Bologna 40138, Italy
Author contributions: Lazzarotto T and Poggioli G contributed equally to this work. Cuicchi D, Lazzarotto T, D’Errico A and Poggioli G participated in the conceptualization and design of the study; Cuicchi D collected data and carried out the initial analyses; Cuicchi D, Gabrielli L and Tardio ML drafted the initial manuscript; Gabrielli L and Rossini G carried out the virological evaluation; Tardio ML, D’Errico A and Poggioli G carried out the histological evaluation; D’Errico A, Poggioli G and Lazzarotto T made substantial contributions to all aspects of the writing of the manuscript, which included contribution to conception, design, analysis and interpretation of the article; Lazzarotto T contributed to the review and revision of the manuscript; Poggioli G interpreted data, reviewed and revised the manuscript, and supervised and provided mentorship throughout all stages of the project and writing of the manuscript; and all authors approved the final version to be submitted.
Institutional review board statement: The study was reviewed and approved by the Institutional Review Board of the Azienda Ospedaliero-Universitaria di Bologna, Italy (Approval No. 2257/2020).
Informed consent statement: All study participants, or their legal guardian, provided informed written consent prior to study enrollment.
Conflict-of-interest statement: All the authors report having no relevant conflicts of interest for this article.
Data sharing statement: Technical appendix, statistical code, and dataset available from the corresponding author at dajana.cuicchi@aosp.bo.it. Participants gave informed consent for data sharing in anonymized form.
STROBE statement: The authors have read the STROBE Statement-checklist of items, and the manuscript was prepared and revised according to the STROBE Statement-checklist of items.
Open-Access: This article is an open-access article that was selected by an in-house editor and fully peer-reviewed by external reviewers. It is distributed in accordance with the Creative Commons Attribution NonCommercial (CC BY-NC 4.0) license, which permits others to distribute, remix, adapt, build upon this work non-commercially, and license their derivative works on different terms, provided the original work is properly cited and the use is non-commercial. See: https://creativecommons.org/Licenses/by-nc/4.0/
Corresponding author: Dajana Cuicchi, MD, PhD, Surgeon, Department of Medical and Surgical Sciences, Surgery of the Alimentary Tract, IRCCS Azienda Ospedaliero-Universitaria di Bologna, Via Massarenti 9, Bologna 40138, Italy. dajana.cuicchi@aosp.bo.it
Received: September 2, 2022
Peer-review started: September 2, 2022
First decision: September 30, 2022
Revised: September 30, 2022
Accepted: November 17, 2022
Article in press: November 17, 2022
Published online: November 28, 2022
Processing time: 83 Days and 20.2 Hours
Core Tip

Core Tip: The detection of viral RNA in gastrointestinal tissue samples has not been adequately investigated. In this trial, 53 rectal biopsies and 6 surgical specimens from coronavirus disease 2019 patients were analyzed, with the primary objective of detecting severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus-2 RNA, using real time reverse transcriptase-polymerase chain reaction, and evaluating the histological features. Viral RNA was not detectable in any of the rectal biopsies performed (0/53). Histological examination of rectal biopsies showed no enterocyte damage, but mild inflammatory infiltration. Viral RNA was detected in 2 surgical specimens of the 6 examined, both of which were from patients with active neoplastic disease. Histological examination also pointed out mild inflammatory infiltration and focal vasculitis.