One in five COVID-19 patients develops mental illness within 90 days – study

LONDON (Reuters) – Many COVID-19 survivors are likely to be at higher risk of developing mental illness, psychiatrists said on Monday, after a large study found that 20% of people infected with the coronavirus receive diagnosed with a psychiatric disorder within 90 days.

Anxiety, depression, and insomnia were most common in COVID-19 patients recovered in the study who developed mental health issues, and the researchers also found significantly higher risks of dementia, a brain disorder.

“People are concerned that COVID-19 survivors are at higher risk for mental health problems, and our results… show that it is likely,” said Paul Harrison, professor of psychiatry at the UK University of Oxford.

Doctors and scientists around the world urgently need to investigate the causes and identify new treatments for mental illness after COVID-19, Harrison said.

“The (health) services must be ready to provide care, especially since our results are likely to be underestimated (by the number of psychiatric patients),” he added.

The study, published in The Lancet Psychiatry, analyzed the electronic health records of 69 million people in the United States, including more than 62,000 cases of COVID-19.

Within three months of testing positive for COVID-19, 1 in 5 survivors have been recorded as having a first diagnosis of anxiety, depression or insomnia. This was about twice as likely as for other groups of patients during the same time period, the researchers said.

The study also found that people with pre-existing mental illnesses were 65% more likely to be diagnosed with COVID-19 than those without.

Mental health specialists who are not directly involved in the study said its findings add to growing evidence that COVID-19 can affect the brain and mind, increasing the risk of various psychiatric illnesses.

“This is likely due to a combination of the psychological stressors associated with this particular pandemic and the physical effects of the disease,” said Michael Bloomfield, consultant psychiatrist at University College London.

Simon Wessely, regius professor of psychiatry at King’s College London, said the finding that people with mental health disorders were also at a higher risk of contracting COVID-19 echoed similar findings during epidemics previous infectious diseases.

“COVID-19 affects the central nervous system and could therefore directly increase subsequent disorders. But this research confirms that that’s not the whole story and that this risk is increased by previous health problems, ”he said.