Comparison of Clinical Characteristics and End-of-Life Care Between COVID-19 and Non-COVID-19 Muslim Patients During the 2020 Pandemic

Background: Little is known about end-of-life care among Muslim patients, particularly during Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID) pandemic, which we report here. Methods: The clinical characteristics, end-of-life care and resuscitation status of Muslim patients who died in the ICU of our tertiary care hospital in year 2020 from COVID were compared to Non-COVID patients. Results: There were 32 patients in COVID and 64 in the Non-COVID group. A major proportion, mainly of Non-COVID patients, already had a hospice eligible terminal disease at baseline (p=.002). COVID patients were admitted to the ICU sooner after hospitalization (2.2 vs. 17 days), had prolonged duration of mechanical ventilation (18.5 vs. 6 days) and longer ICU stay (24 vs. 8 days) than non-COVID patients, respectively (p