Higher levels of circulating desphospho-uncarboxylated matrix Gla protein over time are associated with worse survival: the prospective Maastricht Intensive Care COVID cohort.

"Declarations Ethics approval and consent to participateEthical approval has been obtained from the medical ethics committee (Medisch Ethische Toetsingscommissie 2020-1565/3 00 523) of the Maastricht University Medical Centre + (Maastricht UMC +), which will be performed based on the Declaration of Helsinki. During the pandemic, the board of directors of Maastricht UMC + adopted a policy to inform patients and ask their consent to use the collected data and to store serum samples for COVID-19 research purposes. All study documentation will be stored securely for fifteen years after recruitment of the last patient. The results will be published in peer-reviewed academic journals, with a preference for open access journals, while particularly considering deposition of the manuscripts on a preprint server early. We should inform the reader that the Dutch trial register, in which the cohort had been registered initially, has later been passed over to the international clinical trial registry program. However, our original trial register number remains the same (NL8613). Consent for publicationNot applicable. Competing interestsThe authors declare that they have no competing interests. Competing interests The authors declare that they have no competing interests."

"Funding In the current study, the laboratory measurements were funded by the ILD care foundation."

"The Maastricht Intensive Care COVID (MaastrICCht) cohort is a prospective cohort of patients with confirmed COVID-19 admitted to the ICU of the Maastricht University Medical Centre (MUMC +). The design has been described extensively elsewhere [] and includes comprehensive serial hemostasis and coagulation phenotyping [, ]. The local institutional review board (Medisch Ethische Toetsingscomissie (METC) 2020-1565/300523) of the MUMC + approved the study, which was performed based on the regulations of Helsinki. The study is registered in International Clinical Trials Registry Platform (NL8613). This study included all participants with respiratory insufficiency requiring mechanical ventilation and at least one real-time polymerase chain reaction (RT-PCR) positive for SARS-CoV-2 RNA and a chest CT scan strongly suggestive of SARS-CoV-2 infection, based on a CORADS-score of 4–5 scored by a radiologist [, ]. Participants were followed until they either died in the ICU or were discharged from ICU. A comprehensive and uniform set of clinical, physiological, and laboratory variables was collected daily, reducing the chance of missing data. In addition, when patients were not available for blood sampling or laboratory testing failed, the measurement would be rescheduled for the next blood withdrawal."