A novel coronavirus (CoV) named ‘2019-nCoV’ or ‘2019 novel coronavirus’ or ‘COVID-19’ is a pathogenic virus and is an enveloped, positive single-strand RNA virus. The virus has infected over 46 million people worldwide and the number of deaths had totaled reached over 1.2 million. India reported over 8 million confirmed cases out of which 7.3 million has been recovered, while 121 thousand cases were fatal. Hence this study aims to focus on the trends in the drug utilization and to assess the total direct costs of diagnosis and medical treatment of patients with COVID-19 who are hospitalized in NMCH and RC, Raichur, Karnataka, India. A retrospective cross-sectional study was conducted among 90 patients diagnosed with COVID-19 for a period of six months and data was collected from MRD at a tertiary care teaching hospital. 54% patients were male and 46% were female. Majority of patients were between the age group of 41 to 50 years (23.3%). The hospital stay varied from 6-10 days. The total direct cost for COVID-19 treatment ranges from Rs. 2206 to Rs.74520. Treatment given to patients was antiviral, antibiotics and oxygen therapy. Majority of the patients received Remdesivir (41.2%) followed by oseltamivir (31.2%) as antiviral drugs. Majority of patients received combination of Piperacillin + Tazobactam (73.3%) followed by Doxycycline (72.2%). The combination Piperacillin + Tazobactam and Remdesivir were found to be mostly prescribed and total average direct medical cost was 18509±14092.15 for COVID-19 treatment at Navodaya Medical College Hospital & Research Centre, Raichur.
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