Scientists from Northwestern Medicine found most non-hospitalized COVID-19 “long-haulers” continued to experience symptoms such as brain fog, numbness and tingling, headache, dizziness, blurred vision, tinnitus, and fatigue 15 months after the disease.
The research is published in the Annals of Clinical and Translational Neurology and was conducted by Igor Koralnik et al.
In the study, the team analyzed patients six to nine months after their initial visit to the Neuro COVID-19 Clinic.
They discovered heart rate, blood pressure variation and gut symptoms increased in so-called long-haulers, while loss of taste and smell decreased overall.
Of the 52 patients who completed the follow-up study, the average age was 43, 73% were female, 77% received COVID-19 vaccination, and most continued to experience neurologic symptoms, fatigue, and compromised quality of life 11–18 months after disease onset, on average 15 months.
Overall, there was no change in the frequency of most neurologic symptoms between first and follow-up appointments including numbness/tingling (69 vs. 65%), headache (67 vs. 54%), dizziness (50 vs. 54%), blurred vision (34 vs. 44%), tinnitus (33 vs. 42%) and fatigue (87 vs. 81%).
While the loss of taste (63 vs. 27%) and smell (58 vs. 21%) decreased overall, heart rate and blood pressure variation (35 vs. 56%) and gut symptoms (27 vs. 48%) increased at follow-up.
Patients reported improvements in their recovery, cognitive function, and fatigue, but the quality of life measures remained lower than the average population of the United States.
Seventy-seven percent of the patients were vaccinated for COVID-19, but the vaccine didn’t have a positive or detrimental impact on cognitive function or fatigue.
The team says vaccination didn’t cure long COVID symptoms but didn’t worsen them either, which is a reason given by some long-haulers for not getting vaccinated.
As new variants emerge and the number of patients impacted by long COVID rises, researchers are now focusing our research on understanding the root cause of long COVID.
They are also devising interventions to improve the management of those patients and find the best treatment options for them.
If you care about COVID, please read studies about a new inhaled COVID-19 vaccine, and this heart problem is linked to a 5 times higher death risk in COVID-19.
For more information about COVID, please see recent studies about a new risk factor for severe COVID-19, and results showing many Americans take immune-weakening drugs that may reduce COVID vaccine effects.
Copyright © 2022 Knowridge Science Report. All rights reserved.
