EXPLORING THE RELATION BETWEEN BLOOD
TESTS AND COVID-19 USING MACHINE
LEARNING
Jenil Gandhi
Electronics and Communication engineering
Institute of technology, Nirma University,
Sarkhej – Gandhinagar Highway
Ahmedabad - 382482, India
20bec046@nirmauni.ac.in
Abstract -The COVID-19 pandemic has had a
significant impact on global public health and has
posed significant challenges for healthcare systems
worldwide. In this paper, we explore the relationship
between blood tests and COVID-19 using machine
learning techniques. Specifically, we analyze the
blood test results of COVID-19 patients and
non-COVID-19 patients to identify potential
biomarkers and their correlation with the disease. We
also investigate the use of machine learning
algorithms to predict COVID-19 infection based on
blood test results. Our results show that certain blood
test parameters, such as lymphocyte count,
neutrophil count, and C-reactive protein (CRP)
levels, are significantly associated with COVID-19.
This research has important implications for the
early detection and management of COVID-19, as
well as the development of personalized treatment
plans for infected individuals.
Keywords – COVID-19, Machine Learning, Blood Tests, KNN,
SVM, AdaBoost, Random Forest, Ensemble Learning
I. INTRODUCTION
The COVID-19 pandemic has had a
significant impact on global public health since its
emergence in late 2019. In early 2020, the World
Health Organization declared it a public health
emergency of international concern, leading to
urgent efforts to contain its spread and mitigate its
impact. One of the key challenges in the
management of COVID-19 has been the timely and
accurate diagnosis of infected individuals. With the
increasing number of cases and limited resources,
healthcare systems have faced a daunting task of
Jugal Upadhyay
Electronics and Communication engineering
Institute of technology, Nirma University,
Sarkhej – Gandhinagar Highway
Ahmedabad - 382482, India
20bec048@nirmauni.ac.in
diagnosing patients quickly and efficiently. In
response to this challenge, researchers have turned
to machine learning as a promising tool to aid in the
diagnosis of COVID-19. In this paper, we present
an algorithm to train the given blood report and
COVID report of patients to predict the result of
new patients. This approach aims to provide doctors
with a quick and reliable method of diagnosing
COVID-19, which can potentially save lives and
help curb the spread of the disease. Our method
involves training a machine learning model on a
large dataset of blood reports and COVID reports of
patients to identify key biomarkers that are
indicative of the disease. We demonstrate the
effectiveness of our approach through extensive
experimentation and evaluation, achieving high
accuracy in predicting COVID-19 infection from
blood reports. Our work has significant implications
for the management of COVID-19 and can be a
valuable addition to the toolkit of healthcare
professionals in the fight against this global health
crisis.
In the following section, we will delve into a dataset
acquired from a Brazilian hospital[1] that contains
over 5000 blood test results along with their
COVID-19 diagnosis. While the dataset covers
various blood tests, the ultimate aim is to establish a
connection between crucial independent variables
and the binary classification of COVID-19 (positive
or negative). We will discuss various models and
compare their efficacy in the upcoming sections.

II. Literature review
Machine Learning has been applied in a lot of
research, especially considering the ongoing
COVID-19 pandemic, to help detect patterns and
insights leading or related to the infection. This
section will address some of the published papers
relevant to the subject.
The paper “Detection COVID-19 using Machine
Learning from Blood Tests”[2] presents a study
aimed at detecting COVID-19 in its early stages
using blood tests, with the goal of minimizing the
number of deaths caused by the disease and
reducing the economic impact of the pandemic.The
authors employed machine learning techniques,
including Random Forest, Support Vector Machine,
and Naive Bayes classifiers, to predict COVID-19
status based on the blood test results.
The accuracy of the classifiers was evaluated, and
the Support Vector Machine classifier achieved the
highest accuracy of 88%. The paper”COVID-19
Infection Detection Using Machine Learning“
[3]discusses the use of machine learning techniques
in the detection of COVID-19.The authors introduce
a machine learning-based COVID infection
predictor and measure the prediction accuracy of
five different machine learning models.
A study applied machine learning to detect
COVID-19 in a fast and accurate manner through
deep learning methods [4]. This research relied on
X-ray and CT scan images based on data obtained
from Iran. The researchers obtained 84.67%
accuracy from X-ray images and 98.78% accuracy
in CT.
“Experiment on Deep Learning Models for
COVID-19 Detection from Blood Testing”[5].This
study proposes the use of hematochemical data and
deep learning algorithms as an alternative method
for COVID-19 detection. The authors utilize two
different deep learning architectures, namely
custom-built DNN and TabNet, to classify
Coronavirus infections using complete blood count
test results. Three datasets obtained from hospitals
in Italy, Brazil, and Indonesia are used to train the
models. The average AUC scores obtained for the
models trained with datasets from San Raphael
Hospital in Italy, Albert Einstein Hospital in Brazil,
and Pasar Minggu Hospital in Indonesia are 0.87,
0.90, and 0.88, respectively.
III. DATA SET
The research we conducted involved the use of a
dataset obtained from the Albert Einstein Hospital
located in São Paulo, Brazil. The data comprised
information on patients who had their samples
collected for COVID-19 tests, as well as other
laboratory tests, all of which were anonymized
using appropriate procedures. The hospital itself
uploaded the dataset to Kaggle and it encompasses
the period from 28th March to 3rd April 2020,
consisting of 5644 observations and 111 variables,
one of which is the dependent variable indicating
the COVID-19 test result (positive or negative).
FEATURE RESULT
Number of observations 5644
Total attributes 111
POSITIVE VS NEGATIVE CASES
The dataset we used in our study contained 5644 records of
COVID-19 tests conducted at the Albert Einstein Hospital in
São Paulo, Brazil. Among these records, approximately 10%
or 558 cases were found to be positive, while around 90% or
5086 cases were negative. One issue with this dataset is that it
is imbalanced, meaning that the number of positive cases is
much lower than the number of negative cases. However, this
reflects the reality of the situation where the number of
individuals infected with COVID-19 is significantly less than
the number of uninfected individuals.
A heatmap is a graphical representation of data that uses a
color-coding scheme to show the degree of variation or
magnitude of the data. In our case, the heatmap created using
Python language was used to visualize the missing values in a
dataset. By doing so, the heatmap allowed us to easily spot
patterns of missing values and identify any columns or rows
that contained a large number of missing values. This
information is crucial for data analysis as missing values can
have a significant impact on the accuracy of statistical models
and conclusions drawn from the data.
We generated distribution plots consisting of
histograms with density curves for each numerical
(float) column in a given DataFrame. The loop
iterates over each numerical column in the
DataFrame, and a new figure is created for each
plot. The seaborn library's distplot function is used
to plot the distribution of values in each column.
The histogram shows the frequency or density of
the values on the x-axis, while the y-axis represents
the values in the column. A normal distribution
curve is also overlaid on top of the histogram to
display the estimated probability density function of
the data. The code is helpful in visualizing the
distribution of numerical variables in the
DataFrame, enabling the identification of any
patterns or anomalies in the data. This technique
can be useful in data analysis and machine learning
applications.
A box plot, also known as a box-and-whisker plot,
is a graphical representation of the distribution of a
dataset. It shows the median, quartiles, and outliers
of the data in a compact and easy-to-read format.
The box in the plot represents the interquartile range
(IQR), which is the range between the first quartile
(Q1) and the third quartile (Q3). The whiskers
extend from the box to the minimum and maximum
values that are within 1.5 times the IQR. Box plots
are useful for comparing the distributions of
multiple datasets or for identifying potential outliers
in a dataset. They are commonly used in statistical
analysis, data visualization, and exploratory data
analysis.
In machine learning, correlation refers to the
relationship between the input features and the
target variable in a dataset. It measures the strength
and direction of the linear association between the
features and the target variable, which is the
variable that the machine learning model is trying to
predict.
Correlation analysis in machine learning is
important because it can help identify which
features are most relevant for predicting the target
variable. Highly correlated features can be
problematic in machine learning because they can
introduce multicollinearity, which is a situation
where two or more features are highly correlated
with each other, making it difficult for the machine
learning model to determine the independent effect
of each feature on the target variable. In such cases,
it may be necessary to remove one of the correlated
features from the dataset to avoid overfitting and
improve the model's performance.
Correlation analysis is commonly used in feature
selection and feature engineering in machine
learning, where the goal is to select the most
relevant features for the machine learning model
and to transform the features to improve the model's
performance.
IV. DATA PREPROCESSING
Data preprocessing in machine learning refers to
the process of preparing and cleaning data before it
is used to train a machine learning model. This is an
essential step in the machine learning pipeline
because the quality of the data can significantly
impact the performance of the model.
Data preprocessing involves several steps,
including:
1. Data cleaning: This involves removing or
correcting any errors or inconsistencies in
the data, such as missing values, incorrect
data types, or outliers.
2. Data normalization: This involves scaling
the data to a standard range, such as between
0 and 1, to ensure that all features contribute
equally to the model.
3. Feature selection: This involves selecting the
most relevant features for the model and
removing any redundant or irrelevant
features.
4. Data splitting: This involves dividing the
data into training, validation, and testing sets
to evaluate the model's performance and
prevent overfitting.
By performing these preprocessing steps, the
quality of the data is improved, and the machine
learning model can better identify patterns and
make accurate predictions. Data preprocessing is an
iterative process that requires careful consideration
and experimentation to achieve optimal results.
Pre processing performed by us-
The first line of code is selecting the column names
where the missing value rate is less than 0.9 and
greater than 0.88. This means that it is selecting
columns where the proportion of missing values
falls between 88% and 90%. These columns are
being assigned to a list called 'blood_columns'.
The second line of code is selecting the column
names where the missing value rate is less than 0.88
and greater than 0.75. This means that it is selecting
columns where the proportion of missing values
falls between 75% and 88%. These columns are
being assigned to a list called 'viral_columns'.
This line of code is selecting a subset of columns
from the pandas DataFrame 'df' and assigning it
back to 'df'.
The selected columns include the ones specified in
three separate lists: 'key_columns', 'blood_columns',
and 'viral_columns'. These lists likely contain
column names that are relevant to some analysis or
modeling task. The '+' operator is used to
concatenate the three lists into a single list of
column names.
By selecting only these columns, the original
DataFrame 'df' is effectively reduced to a smaller
DataFrame that includes only the relevant columns
for the analysis or modeling task. The new
DataFrame is assigned back to 'df'.

V. LEARNING METHODS & RESULTS Result-

Various machine learning methods have been

applied and tested with different parameters to
achieve the best classification outcomes. In this
section, the different applied methods and results
will be discussed.

A. RANDOM FOREST
Random Forest is a popular ensemble learning
algorithm used in machine learning for
classification and regression tasks. It is a collection
of decision trees that work together to improve the
accuracy and stability of predictions.
In the Random Forest algorithm, multiple decision
trees are built on randomly selected subsets of the
training data and features, resulting in a forest of
trees. During training, each tree is grown by
recursively splitting the data into smaller subsets
based on the most discriminative features until a
stopping criterion is reached.
During prediction, the Random Forest algorithm
combines the outputs of individual trees to make a
final prediction.
One of the main advantages of Random Forest is its
ability to handle high-dimensional data with a large
number of features.
B. SVM
Support Vector Machine (SVM) is a popular
supervised learning algorithm used in machine
learning for classification and regression tasks.
SVM aims to find the optimal hyperplane in a
high-dimensional space that maximally separates
the data points of different classes.
In SVM, each data point is represented as a vector
in the feature space and is classified based on its
position relative to the hyperplane. The hyperplane
is chosen such that the margin between the
hyperplane and the closest data points of each class
is maximized. The closest data points are called
support vectors, and they define the margin of the
hyperplane.
SVM has several advantages, including its ability to
handle high-dimensional data with a large number
of features and its robustness to outliers. SVM can
also provide a clear boundary between classes,
making it easy to interpret and visualize the results.

Result-
C. ADAPTIVE BOOSTING
Adaptive Boosting (AdaBoost) is a popular
ensemble learning algorithm used in machine
learning for classification tasks. It works by
combining multiple weak classifiers into a strong
classifier, where each weak classifier is trained on a
different subset of the training data.
During training, AdaBoost assigns higher weights
to misclassified data points, which allows
subsequent weak classifiers to focus on the
hard-to-classify examples. The final strong classifier
is a weighted combination of the individual weak
classifiers, with higher weights assigned to the more
accurate classifiers.
Result-
VI. CONCLUSION
In this paper we investigated various machine
learning algorithms to explore the relation of blood
tests with COVID-19. We applied SVM, AdaBoost,
random forest, and K nearest neighbor. A real
dataset obtained from a Brazilian hospital has been
used to test the models. As accuracy and F measure
are considered, the SVM gives the highest accuracy.
Also, the unbalance of data may also reduce the true
positive rate. Future research direction would
include applying the used and other machine
learning models on more and various real datasets.
XIV. REFERENCES
[1] N. Crokidakis, "Data analysis and modeling of the evolution of
COVID-19 in Brazil," arXiv preprint arXiv:2003.12150, 2020.
[2]N. Hany, N. Atef, N. Mostafa, S. Mohamed, M. ElSahhar and A.
AbdelRaouf, "Detection COVID-19 using Machine Learning from
Blood Tests," 2021 International Mobile, Intelligent, and Ubiquitous
Computing Conference (MIUCC), Cairo, Egypt, 2021, pp. 229-234, doi:
10.1109/MIUCC52538.2021.9447639.
[3]L. Wang, H. Shen, K. Enfield and K. Rheuban, "COVID-19 Infection
Detection Using Machine Learning," 2021 IEEE International
Conference on Big Data (Big Data), Orlando, FL, USA, 2021, pp.
4780-4789, doi: 10.1109/BigData52589.2021.9671700.
[4]M. Z. Alom, M. M. Rahman, M. S. Nasrin, T. M.
Taha and V. K. Asari, "COVID\_{M}{T}{N}et:
COVID-19 Detection with Multi-Task Deep
Learning Approaches," arXiv preprint
arXiv:2004.03747, 2020.
[5]F. Bismadhika, N. N. Qomariyah and A. A. Purwita, "Experiment on
Deep Learning Models for COVID-19 Detection from Blood Testing,"
2021 IEEE International Biomedical Instrumentation and Technology
Conference (IBITeC), Yogyakarta, Indonesia, 2021, pp. 136-141, doi:
10.1109/IBITeC53045.2021.9649254.
[6]https://www.javatpoint.com/machine-learning-random-forest-algorith
m
[7]https://www.geeksforgeeks.org/boosting-in-machine-learning-boostin
g-and-adaboost/