COVID-19: One-third of UK patients showed symptoms for up to six months after discharge

The scope of what the doctors called Prolonged COVID, the long COVID or the post COVID syndrome are still being studied in the future of the pandemic.

It is neither more nor less than affections in organs that go beyond the respiratory system and which are typical of the systemic inflammatory picture that causes SARS-CoV-2 in the body.

A study conducted by researchers from University of Oxford and National Institute for Health Research in the UK have shown that Nearly four in ten people infected with the new coronavirus still had at least one symptom three to six months later.

As the research authors observed, the most common persistent symptoms among the more than 270,000 people surveyed were anxiety and depression, shortness of breath, abdominal problems, fatigue and muscle pain.

For the analysis, the researchers compared the risk of prolonged COVID features in different groups of the population and also contrasted the risk with that of influenza.

Symptoms were more common in people who had previously been hospitalized with COVID-19 and were slightly more common in women, according to the study.

And while the study did not provide any detailed cause for the prolonged symptoms of COVID, their severity or duration, it clarified that older people and men had more breathing difficulties and cognitive problems, while young people and women had more headaches, abdominal symptoms and anxiety or depression.

“Knowing the risk of prolonged COVID functions helps plan the provision of relevant health services”, evaluated the authors in the conclusions of their work published in the journal Plos Medicine. For them, “the fact that the risk is higher after COVID-19 than after influenza suggests that its origin could, in part, directly involve infection with SARS-CoV-2 and is not only a general consequence of viral infection. This could help develop effective long-term COVID treatments. “

Oxford University professor Paul Harrison led the study and argued that there is a need “Identify the mechanisms underlying the various symptoms that can affect survivors”, while considering that “this information will be essential to prevent or effectively treat the long-term health consequences of COVID-19”.

The new research joins other studies that found persistent symptoms of COVID are common.

The authors of this work considered for its realization that “although several studies have addressed the question of the long-term sequelae of COVID-19, all have important limitations”. And they illustrated: “The results of a telephone survey in France (with a response rate of 57% reaching 478 patients) showed that four months after hospitalization for COVID-19, around half of the patients had at least a feature of prolonged COVID ”.

Likewise, in an application-based cohort study of 4,182 cases of COVID-19, 13% of respondents reported features of prolonged COVID, with evidence of higher rates in women and the elderly. Another survey followed 1,733 patients hospitalized with COVID-19 for six months and found fatigue or muscle weakness in 63%, difficulty sleeping in 26%, anxiety or depression in 23%, and lower rates of myalgia and headaches. .

For researchers, “These studies do not have a control group and have limited generalizability, focusing on inpatients or people who have voluntarily completed a telephone survey or used an app.”

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