Research shows that a number of survivors of COVID-19 experience a number of symptoms after recovery or long-term effects of COVID-19. Long COVID, as the condition is called, is associated with more than 200 symptoms ranging from fatigue, joint pain, to brain and heart conditions that are no longer the same.
In an international study examining the long-term effects of the coronavirus, researchers led by a team from University College London (UCL), UK interviewed COVID-19 victims who reported symptoms that persisted for months.
The most common long COVID symptoms include:
Fatigue
Hard to breath
Joint pain
Fatigue
Chest ache
Loss of smell and / or taste
Memory disorders and inability to concentrate properly
Sleep problems.
Easy to feel tired in 98% of respondents, post -activity malaise (symptoms that worsen after physical or mental activity) was experienced by 89% of respondents, and cognitive dysfunction or often referred to as brain fog was 85% of respondents.
Other symptoms include visual hallucinations, tremors, itchy skin, changes in the menstrual cycle, sexual dysfunction, palpitations, bladder control problems, herpes zoster, memory loss, blurred vision, diarrhea, and tinnitus.
The research, published in the journal EClinicalMedicine Lancet, involved 3,762 participants from 56 countries. A total of 1,020 of them were confirmed cases and 2,742 people were suspected of having the disease. The researchers identified a total of 203 symptoms in 10 organ systems, with 66 symptoms detected over seven months.
The team behind the report, which all have long -standing COVID symptoms, asked for clinical guidelines to evaluate affected patients extended beyond cardiovascular and respiratory function tests, to consider a variety of symptoms, including those affecting neuropsychiatric and neurological function.
Symptoms for months
“For the first time, this study highlights a broad spectrum of symptoms, particularly neurological, prevalent and persistent in long-term COVID-19 patients,” said Dr Athena Akrami, a neurologist from the Sainsbury Wellcome Center at UCL and senior author of the report.
“Memory and cognitive dysfunction experienced by more than 85% of respondents, is the most widespread and long -lasting neurological symptom, the same also occurs at all ages, and with a major impact on employment,” he continued.
Other symptoms are headache, insomnia, vertigo, neuralgia, neuropsychiatric changes, tremors, sensitivity to sound and light, hallucinations (smelling etc.), tinnitus, and other sensorimotor symptoms are also common, and may indicate larger neurological problems that involving the central and peripheral nervous systems.
“Along with well -documented respiratory and cardiovascular symptoms, there is now a clear need to expand medical guidelines to assess a wider range of symptoms when diagnosing long -term COVID,” Akrami said.
“There may be tens of thousands of COVID patients who have long suffered in silence, they are not convinced that their symptoms are still related to the COVID-19 they are experiencing,” he explained.
However, the researchers cautioned that the retrospective nature of the study raises the possibility of memory bias, while the fact that the survey was distributed in online support groups increased the risk of sample bias in long -term COVID patients.
The survey was also heavily answered by English -speaking respondents (92%) and white respondents (85%), increasing the likelihood that some conditions experienced by other demographics may not be recorded.
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