Post by JABPost by Julieta Shemwe need to keep the bacteria out.
New Evidence Suggests Long COVID Could Be a Brain Injury
Brain fog is one of the most common, persistent complaints in patients
with long COVID. It affects as many as 46% of patients who also deal
with other cognitive concerns like memory loss and difficulty
concentrating.
Now, researchers believe they know why. A new study has found that
these symptoms may be the result of a viral-borne brain injury that
may cause cognitive and mental health issues that persist for years.
Researchers found that 351 patients hospitalized with severe COVID-19
had evidence of a long-term brain injury a year after contracting the
SARS-CoV-2 virus. The findings were based on a series of cognitive
tests, self-reported symptoms, brain scans, and biomarkers.
https://www.medscape.com/viewarticle/new-evidence-suggests-long-covid-could-be-brain-injury-2024a10002v0?form=fpf
The website sucks. Full article below. Thanks for posting.
Interesting passages:
Brain scans have previously shown atrophy to the brain's gray matter
in COVID-19 patients, likely caused by inflammation from a heightened
immune response rather than the virus itself.
One study, from the National Institute of Neurological Disorders and
Stroke (NINDS), found that in those infected with COVID-19 who already
had dementia, the virus "rapidly accelerated structural and functional
brain deterioration."
[...] researchers don't know about the impact on those who had less
serious cases of the virus.
Perhaps nothing happens to those who had less serious cases of the virus
because so many people contracted the virus and didn't experience any
symptom at all. In other words, it is not quite the virus that's the
heart of the problem. It's might be people's health that need some
love.
(*) Full article
New Evidence Suggests Long COVID Could Be a Brain Injury Sara Novak
February 08, 2024
Brain fog is one of the most common, persistent complaints in patients
with long COVID. It affects as many as 46% of patients who also deal
with other cognitive concerns like memory loss and difficulty
concentrating.
Now, researchers believe they know why. A new study has found that these
symptoms may be the result of a viral-borne brain injury that may cause
cognitive and mental health issues that persist for years.
Researchers found that 351 patients hospitalized with severe COVID-19
had evidence of a long-term brain injury a year after contracting the
SARS-CoV-2 virus. The findings were based on a series of cognitive
tests, self-reported symptoms, brain scans, and biomarkers.
Brain Deficits Equal to 20 Years of Brain Aging As part of the preprint
study, participants took a cognition test with their scores age-matched
to those who had not suffered a serious bout of COVID-19. Then a blood
sample was taken to look for specific biomarkers, showing that elevated
levels of certain biomarkers were consistent with a brain injury. Using
brain scans, researchers also found that certain regions of the brain
associated with attention were reduced in volume.
Patients who participated in the study were "less accurate and slower"
in their cognition, and suffered from at least one mental health
condition, such as depression, anxiety, or posttraumatic stress
disorder, according to researchers.
The brain deficits found in COVID-19 patients were equivalent to 20
years of brain aging and provided proof of what doctors have feared:
that this virus can damage the brain and result in ongoing mental health
issues.
"We found global deficits across cognition," said lead study author
Benedict Michael, PhD, director of the Infection Neuroscience Lab at the
University of Liverpool in Liverpool, England. "The cognitive and memory
problems that patients complained of were associated with
neuroanatomical changes to the brain."
Proof That Symptoms Aren't 'Figment' of Patients' Imaginations Cognitive
deficits were common among all patients, but the researchers said they
don't yet know whether the brain damage causes permanent cognitive
decline. But the research provides patients who have been overlooked by
some clinicians with proof that their conditions aren't a figment of
their imaginations, said Karla L. Thompson, PhD, lead neuropsychologist
at the University of North Carolina School of Medicine's COVID Recovery
Clinic.
"Even though we're several years into this pandemic, there are still a
lot of providers who don't believe that their patients are experiencing
these residual symptoms," said Thompson, "That's why the use of
biomarkers is important, because it provides an objective indication
that the brain has been compromised in some way."
Some patients with long COVID have said that getting their doctors to
believe they have a physical ailment has been a persistent problem
throughout the pandemic and especially as it relates to the
sometimes-vague collection of symptoms associated with brain fog. One
study found that as many as 79% of study respondents reported negative
interactions with their healthcare providers when they sought treatment
for their long-COVID symptoms.
How Do COVID-Related Brain Injuries Happen? Researchers are unsure
what's causing these brain injuries, though they have identified some
clues. Previous research has suggested that such injuries might be the
result of a lack of oxygen to the brain, especially in patients who were
hospitalized, like those in this study, and were put on ventilators.
Brain scans have previously shown atrophy to the brain's gray matter in
COVID-19 patients, likely caused by inflammation from a heightened
immune response rather than the virus itself. This inflammatory response
seems to affect the central nervous system. As part of the new study,
researchers found some neuroprotective effects of using steroids during
hospitalization to reduce brain inflammation.
The results suggest that clinicians should overcome their skepticism and
consider the possibility that their patients have suffered a brain
injury and should be treated appropriately, said James C. Jackson, PsyD,
a neuropsychiatrist at Vanderbilt University School of Medicine. "The
old saying is that if it walks like a duck and talks like a duck, it's a
duck," said Jackson.
He contends that treatments used for patients who have brain injuries
have also been shown to be effective in treating long COVID–related
brain fog symptoms. These may include speech, cognitive, and
occupational therapy as well as meeting with a neuropsychiatrist for the
treatment of related mental health concerns.
A New Path Forward Treating long-COVID brain fog like a brain injury can
help patients get back to some semblance of normalcy, researchers
said. "What we're seeing in terms of brain injury biomarkers and
differences in brain scans correlates to real-life problems that these
patients are dealing with on a daily basis," said Jackson. These include
problems at work and in life with multitasking, remembering details,
meeting deadlines, synthesizing large amounts of information, and
maintaining focus on the task at hand, he said.
There's also a fear that even with treatment, the aging of the brain
caused by the virus might have long-term repercussions and that this
enduring injury may cause the early onset of dementia and Alzheimer's
disease in those who were already vulnerable to it. One study, from the
National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke (NINDS), found
that in those infected with COVID-19 who already had dementia, the virus
"rapidly accelerated structural and functional brain deterioration."
"We already know the role that neuroinflammation plays in the brains of
patients with Alzheimer's disease," said Thompson. "If long COVID is
involved in prolonged inflammation of the brain, it goes a long way in
explaining the mechanism underlying [the study's reported] brain aging."
Still More to Learn In some ways, this study raises nearly as many
questions as it does answers. While it provides concrete evidence around
the damage the virus is doing to the brains of patients who contracted
severe COVID-19, researchers don't know about the impact on those who
had less serious cases of the virus.
For Ziyad Al-Aly, MD, chief of research and development at the Veterans
Affairs St. Louis Health Care System, the concern is that some
long-COVID patients may be suffering from cognitive deficits that are
more subtle but still impacting their daily lives, and that they're not
getting the help they need.
What's more, said Al-Aly, it's unclear whether the impacts of the brain
damage are permanent or how to stop them from worsening. Researchers and
clinicians need a better understanding of the mechanism that allows this
virus to enter the brain and do structural damage. If it's inflammation,
will anti-inflammatory or antiviral medications work at preventing it?
Will steroids help to offset the damage? "It's critical we find some
answers," he said.
"SARS-CoV-2 isn't going anywhere. It will continue to infect the
population, so if this is indeed a virus that damages the brain in the
long term or permanently, we need to figure out what can be done to stop
it," said Al-Aly.