Researchers Identify Over 50 Long-Term Effects of COVID-19

Persistent symptoms range from mild to debilitating and last for weeks to months after recovery.

As the number of hospitalizations from COVID-19 rises again in a fourth wave more than 18 months after the pandemic began, some patients continue to experience symptoms long after recovering from COVID, according to a Houston Methodist study recently published in Nature’s Scientific Reports.

Lead author Sonia Villapol, Ph.D., an assistant professor of neurosurgery at the Center for Neuroregeneration at Houston Methodist, and her collaborators discovered more than 50 long-term effects of COVID-19 in the 47,910 patients included in the analysis. At the top of the list, the most common of these persistent symptoms, which range from mild to debilitating and last weeks to months after initial recovery, are fatigue in 58%, followed by headaches (44%), attention deficit (27%), hair loss ( 25%), shortness of breath (24%), loss of taste (23%), and loss of smell (21%).

Other symptoms were related to lung disease, such as coughing, chest discomfort, reduced lung diffusion capacity, sleep apnea, and pulmonary fibrosis; cardiovascular problems, such as arrhythmias and myocarditis; and non-specific problems, such as tinnitus and night sweats. The researchers were surprised to also find a prevalence of neurological symptoms, such as dementia, depression, anxiety and obsessive-compulsive disorder.

Long after they leave the hospital, some patients have persistent symptoms for weeks to months after recovering from COVID-19. Credit: Houston Methodist

To assess these long-term effects of COVID-19, the research team identified a total of 18,251 publications, 15 of which met the inclusion criteria for their study. The peer-reviewed studies they analyzed were conducted in the US, Europe, UK, Australia, China, Egypt and Mexico and consisted of data published before 2021, following patient cohorts ranging from 102 to 44,799 adults aged 17 and over. -87 years.

The studies collected information from self-reported patient studies, medical records and clinical evaluation, with a post-COVID follow-up time ranging from 14 to 110 days. Patients hospitalized for COVID-19 made up 40% of the studies and the rest followed a mix of mild, moderate and severe COVID-19 patients.

The research team conducted a systematic review and meta-analysis of these studies to estimate the prevalence of any symptoms, signs, or abnormal laboratory parameters beyond the acute phase of COVID-19. They measured several biomarkers, including abnormal chest X-rays or CT scans, risk of blood clots, presence of inflammation, anemia, and indicators of possible heart failure, bacterial infection and lung damage. They found that 80% of recovered adults had at least one long-term symptom that persisted for weeks to months after acute infection with mild, moderate, or severe COVID-19.

In total, the team identified 55 persistent symptoms, signs and abnormal laboratory results, with most of the lingering effects similar to the symptomatology developed during the acute phase of COVID-19. By identifying the same lingering effects in different countries, the researchers say their study confirms that the burden of Lung COVID is significant and emphasizes the urgency of recognizing these chronic complications, communicating them clearly to the community, and defining therapeutics. strategies to prevent long-term consequences of COVID-19. The next phase of their research will focus on determining what makes some individuals more susceptible to Lung COVID.

Reference: “Over 50 Long-Term Effects of COVID-19: A Systematic Review and Meta-analysis” by Sandra Lopez-Leon, Talia Wegman-Ostrosky, Carol Perelman, Rosalinda Sepulveda, Paulina A. Rebolledo, Angelica Cuapio, and Sonia Villapol, Aug. 9 2021, scientific reports.
DOI: 10.1038/s41598-021-95565-8

Joining Villapol on this study were Sandra Lopez-Leon with Novartis Pharmaceuticals, Talia Wegman-Ostrosky with Instituto Nacional de Cancerología in Mexico, Carol Perelman with National Autonomous University of Mexico, Rosalinda Sepulveda with Harvard TH Chan School of Public Health, Paulina A. Rebolledo with Emory University and Angelica Cuapio with Karolinska Institutet.