A retrospective review comparing the pulmonary chest CT findings of patients with COVID-19 pneumonia with those with other types of viral pneumonia found that a peripheral distribution, a lesion range > 10 cm, involvement of 5 lobes, presence of hilar and mediastinal lymph node enlargement, and no pleural effusion were significantly associated with 2019-novel coronavirus pneumonia.

• Review includes 154 patients with RT-PCR-confirmed COVID-19 pneumonia diagnosed between February 11 and 20, 2020, and 100 patients with other types of viral pneumonia diagnosed between April 2011 and December 2020 from two hospitals in China.
• The results are adjusted for age, sex, and body mass index [BMI] and other significantly associated clinical and imaging characteristics in univariate regression analysis:
• A peripheral distribution was associated with an OR of 13.04 (95%CI 4.12, 41.27) for COVID-19 pneumonia, compared with a diffuse distribution.
• A maximum lesion range > 10 cm was associated with an OR of 9.75 (95%CI 3.06, 31.13) for COVID-19 pneumonia, compared with a maximum lesion range ≤ 5 cm
• The involvement of 5 lobes was associated with an OR of 8.45 (95%CI 2.28, 31.28) for COVID-19 pneumonia, compared with a maximum lesion range ≤ 2
• No pleural effusion was associated with an OR of 3.58 (95%CI 1.47, 8.72) for COVID-19 pneumonia compared with the presence of pleural effusion.
• Hilar and mediastinal lymph node enlargement was associated with an OR of 2.79 (95%CI 1.29, 6.02) for COVID-19 pneumonia.