Nerve damage may explain some cases of long COVID, U.S. study suggests – CBC

60% of patients in small study had nerve damage, which may point to new treatments

Mar 02, 2022

A small study of patients suffering from persistent symptoms long after a bout of COVID-19 found that nearly 60 per cent had nerve damage possibly caused by a defective immune response, a finding that could point to new treatments, researchers have found.

The new U.S. study involved in-depth exams of 17 people with so-called long COVID, a condition that arises within three months of a COVID-19 infection and lasts at least two months.

“I think what’s going on here is that the nerves that control things like our breathing, blood vessels and our digestion in some cases are damaged in these long COVID patients,” said Dr. Anne Louise Oaklander, a neurologist at Massachusetts General Hospital and a lead author on the study published in the journal Neurology: Neuroimmunology & Neuroinflammation.

As many as 30 per cent of people who have COVID-19 are believed to develop long COVID, a condition with symptoms ranging from fatigue, rapid heartbeat, shortness of breath, cognitive difficulties, chronic pain, sensory abnormalities and muscle weakness.

Read more: https://www.cbc.ca/news/health/long-covid-nerve-damage-study-1.6369906

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