[imagesource: Miles Fujimoto/College of Science]

We’ve heard many stories about ‘Long COVID’, with sufferers experiencing brain fog and fatigue long after they recover, and now a new study published in the Lancet Psychiatry Journal has revealed that COVID-19 symptoms can end up lingering in the brain.

Many ‘long-haulers’ (people who feel COVID-19 symptoms for a long time, even after ‘recovery’) are reporting feeling what is now being called ‘Post-COVID Syndrome’.

The symptoms are included in the range of neurological and psychological; brain fog, confusion, fatigue, anxiety, PTSD, loss of smell and taste, seizures, and movement complications to name a few.

CNN reports:

They found 34% of Covid-19 survivors received a diagnosis for a neurological or psychological condition within six months of their infection, according to the study.

The most common diagnosis was anxiety, found in 17% of those treated for Covid-19, followed by mood disorders, found in 14% of patients.

It turns out, developing mental health problems is more frequent across the board, compared to patients who develop neurological complications.

It depends on the severity of the case. These effects are mostly felt by severe patients who need hospitalisation for recovery, but there is also a fair number of outpatients who feel the effects long after the actual infection, too.

The study is the biggest yet, using electronic health records of over 236 000 US-based patients. The records are also compared with patients suffering from other respiratory infections.

“This is a robust piece of work in a large cohort demonstrating the association between Covid-19 and psychiatric and neurological complications,” [Dr. Musa Sami, a clinical associate professor in psychiatry at the University of Nottingham] said in a statement. “This is a very important topic as there has been considerable consternation regarding Covid-19 as a ‘brain disease.'”

They observed that those with Covid-19 had a 44% increased risk for neurological and psychiatric illness compared to people recvering from flu. And they were 16% more likely to experience those effects compared with people with other respiratory tract infections.

The positive aspects of the study’s findings were that it isn’t very likely for COVID-19 patients to develop Parkinsonism or Guillain-Barré syndrome afterwards, which are diseases associated with viral infections.

Although at an individual level these findings are less likely to apply, the study does provide substantial data for the health care system to take the necessary precautions.

Medical professionals should realise that they need to provide care for well over six months of recovery.

[source:cnn]