About 12 percent of COVID-19 patients had gastrointestinal symptoms, including diarrhea, a new study shows.
For the study, published in JAMA Network Open, researchers searched the Medline/PubMed and Embase databases as well as preprint servers bioRxiv and medRxiv for COVID-19 studies conducted from Nov. 1, 2019, to March 30. Studies published on preprint servers typically have not been peer-reviewed.
Researchers identified and analyzed 29 studies, mostly from China, involving 4,805 patients with COVID-19.
They found that 7.4 percent of patients reported having diarrhea and 4.6 percent reported being nauseous or vomiting.
Viral genetic material was detected in the feces of 40.5 percent of patients with COVID-19.