With millions of people afflicted by Covid-19, survivors and their doctors are wondering what other persistent effects this illness might have?
It’s an important question, not just because of the sheer volume of people afflicted, but also because of the likelihood that many sufferers could be left with permanent damage to their lungs and other vital organs, requiring costly, long term medical care and support.
Dr. Avi Nath, is a physician-scientist with the National Institutes of Health in Bethesda, Maryland. Avi is clinical director of the Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke and heads the section that looks at infections of the nervous system.
He says, “We thought for a long time that once you have it, then you’re done with it. That would be it. But, it turns out that that’s not the case. Thousands of patients now are complaining of the fact that they have persistent symptoms; that their fever goes away. And, you know, all the other symptoms, the cough and other things, and now they’re developing other kinds of symptoms.”
The lingering symptoms that Covid-19 patients experience are fairly broad. Avi is interested in brain fog, malaise, tiredness — symptoms reminiscent of myalgic encephalomyelitis
or chronic fatigue syndrome, which he says is linked with a lot of viral infections. Covid-19, though, has also been associated with some other neurological complications, including strokes, as well as brain bleeds and inflammation.
Avi says,” These things are happening later in the course of the infection, suggesting that there’s an immune component to it. So, you know, the virus goes down and the immune system gets hyperactive and it can cause a variety of different types of neurological symptoms. That’s quite possible. Other organ systems are also affected in different ways. But I’ve focused largely on the neurological aspect. So that’s what I’m most familiar with.”
As unfortunate as these rare problems are, Avi says they represent an opportunity to learn how and why these post-viral syndromes occur – their biological pathways – so that we might be able to prevent them.
“Oftentimes you know, by the time you see the patient, you don’t really know what infection they had and the virus is never figured out. And it’s too late to figure out what virus they have. Now, that’s not an excuse any longer. You know exactly what virus caused it. And you know exactly what the syndrome is. And you know exactly what happened in between. So I think it’s an unfortunate situation, but you can use it to your advantage to try and understand these diseases that we haven’t been able to do for a long, long time.”
The NIH has several research teams trying to unlock the secrets of these post-viral illnesses. Another doctor I spoke with is investigating what’s termed the natural history of infection in dozens of Covid-19 patients.
Dr. Anthony Suffredini is a critical care physician in the Critical Care Medicine Department at the Clinical Center, which is the research hospital associated with the National Institutes of Health.
Anthony has begun enrolling patients in a study that aims to follow patients for a year to track the impact it’s had on their heart, lungs and kidneys.
“The study is composed of two cohorts. Patients who are acutely ill, who would be followed from the time of the onset of their symptoms and to one year. And then we will be getting patients from… who’d been treated at the outside hospitals, who would be enrolled after their acute illness and to see, again, the consequences in terms of their cardiac their pulmonary function as well as their kidney function, renal function.”
Anthony will be comparing the results across a spectrum of Covid-19 patients.
“And we’re really trying to enrol not just the critically ill patients. We’re very interested in also the young person who might have an infection, they lose their sense of smell and taste. They have a fever. They feel kind of like they had a bad flu and they get better. So those people are very interesting to look at simply because what are the consequences? How do they get better and how does that differ from someone in a similar age group who doesn’t get better and who deteriorates and requires an ICU admission?”
Subscribe to our YouTube channel: https://bit.ly/2TwO8Gm
QUICKTAKE ON SOCIAL:
Follow QuickTake on Twitter: twitter.com/quicktake
Like QuickTake on Facebook: facebook.com/quicktake
Follow QuickTake on Instagram: instagram.com/quicktake
Subscribe to our newsletter: https://bit.ly/2FJ0oQZ
Email us at quicktakenews@gmail.com
QuickTake by Bloomberg is a global news network delivering up-to-the-minute analysis on the biggest news, trends and ideas for a new generation of leaders.
