According to Cooney, the syndrome can "cause weakness, numbness, and tingling. Physicians also are assessing whether the novel coronavirus is more likely than other viruses to cause a syndrome called demyelination, in which inflammation in the brain causes the immune system to attack the protective coating of nerve cells, Pelak said. "What I am concerned about is long-term effects, obviously in the who have been hospitalized, but I think it's definitely time to understand long-term sequelae for those individuals who have never been hospitalized"-and it's not just limited to "older individuals," but includes "young, too." "If you have an uncontrolled level of inflammation, that leads to toxicity and dysregulation," Al-Harthi said. Lena Al-Harthi, chair of the department of microbial pathogens and immunity at Rush Medical College, explained that bits of the virus-rather than the virus multiplying-can spur the brain's inflammatory response. They think, for instance, that the new coronavirus damages the brain and nervous symptom through inflammation, not through a direct attack on those systems. Victoria Pelak, a professor of neurology and ophthalmology at the University of Colorado School of Medicine, said treating Covid-19 patients with neurological symptoms has been like "trying to put out the fire." She explained, "Because you are so concerned with the raging fire," of Covid-19, "you haven't really been able to pay attention to the nervous system as much as you normally would."īut doctors have started putting some pieces together, Cooney writes. Nor do they know for certain why the brain is affected." What's causing the neurological symptoms?Īccording to Cooney, researchers at the moment can say little "definitively about how best to prevent and treat neuropsychological manifestations of Covid-19. And, according to Pelzman, his patients also have reported lingering effects from Covid-19, with one unable to complete simple math calculations in her head and others struggling to find correct words when communicating. Similarly, Fred Pelzman, an internal medicine physician from New York who fell ill with Covid-19 in March, said he is still experiencing symptoms of the disease, including depressed abilities to taste and smell. Bonfiglio said he's since regained some strength and the dizziness and tremors are now gone. Once Bonfiglio was finally transferred out of the ICU-after spending 17 days on a ventilator-he said he was so confused that he forgot his name, forget where he was, and sometimes tried to slide from his bed to the floor.īonfiglio said he also felt more emotional than usual during his recovery and experienced persistent dizziness, hand tremors, and muscle weakness-so much so that he had to relearn how to walk. John Bonfiglio, 64, reported many such symptoms after he recovered from a serious bout with Covid-19 at Newton-Wellesley Hospital, Cooney reports. Teodor Postolache, a professor of psychiatry at the University of Maryland School of Medicine, estimates that "between 30% and 50% of people with infection that has clinical manifestations are going to have some form of mental health issues," ranging from "anxiety or depression but also nonspecific symptoms that include fatigue, sleep, and waking abnormalities, a general sense of not being at your best, not being fully recovered in terms of the abilities of performing academically, occupationally, potentially physically." And that's on top of the long-term physical symptoms Covid-19 can cause, including damage to the heart, kidneys, and liver, Cooney reports. Further, experts told STAT News that, in addition to mood disorders, they've seen patients who recovered from their coronavirus infections experience neuropsychological symptoms including dizziness, numbed limbs, brain fog, long-term loss of smell and taste, muscle weakness, and nerve damage so severe that patients struggled to walk. How Covid-19 will impact behavioral health services Patients experience numbness, anxiety, and fatigue well after Covid-19 'recovery'Īccording to Cooney, early reports from China and Europe revealed that some patients recovering from Covid-19, the disease caused by the new coronavirus, experienced anxiety and depression. Up to one-third of people who had Covid-19 report lingering neurological and psychological symptoms due to the disease, ranging from numb limbs to a mental slowness some people are calling "Covid fog"-a finding that "reflect a growing consensus that the disease can have lasting impact on the brain," Elizabeth Cooney reports for STAT News.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |