How Covid is getting on people’s nerves | Delhi News – Times of India

NEW DELHI: A first-of-its kind study that evaluated neurological symptoms has revealed more than one-third of Covid-19 patients, especially the younger ones, suffer from headache, encephalopathy and dizziness among others.
While the infection subsides in two weeks, the neurological effects remain longer, states the US-based study published in Annals of Clinical and Translational Neurology (ACTN).
It involved 509 patients, both men and women, of whom 134 (26%) had severe symptoms requiring mechanical ventilation.

Neurologic manifestations were present at Covid-19 onset in 215 patients (42%), at hospital admission in 319 patients (62.7%) and at any time during the disease course in 419 patients (82.3%), the research found.
Covid-19 can affect the brain in multiple ways. First, the viral infection is known to affect lung function, which can cause lack of oxygen in the body. If the brain doesn’t get enough oxygen, it can get affected too leading to unconsciousness, confusion and even death. Second, Covid-19 is known to cause loss of taste and smell, which means that it affects the olfactory nerve, the shortest of the nerves emerging from the brain, which is responsible for this function, say doctors.
According to Dr Kameshwar Prasad, professor of neurology at All India Institute of Medical Sciences (AIIMS) who is part of an international project for analysis of neurological manifestations due to Covid-19 from India, the infection can travel to the brain causing neurological disorders directly through this route or through bloodstream.
“Covid-19 can also leave a long-lasting effect on the brain, which manifests into clinical symptoms much later,” Dr Prasad said. He added that in between 1916 and 1930, there was an epidemic due to encephalitis lethargica – a neurological syndrome also known as sleeping sickness – which affected millions globally.
“The aftereffects of the viral infection were seen for many years. This included development of parkinsonism on an average two years after the infection,” the AIIMS doctor said. He advised that people who are discharged after treatment of Covid-19 need to be followed and watched systematically for at least a few months to detect any long-term consequence, for example effects on memory, concentration and other brain functions.
At AIIMS, Dr Prasad said, they have come across cases where a patient suffering from Covid-19 reported with serious complications involving brain like stroke and Guillain-Barre syndrome, which is a rare disorder in which your body’s immune system attacks your nerves.
In the US study, researchers found that muscle pain, headache, and inflammation of brain muscles were the most common neurological manifestations of Covid-19.
More surprisingly, the ACTN study found patients presenting with any neurologic manifestations were younger than those without and had a longer time from Covid-19 onset to hospitalisation. “Most of the neurological complications have been observed to affect younger people more than the older people. This could be because the immunological reaction to the virus, which is known as the cytokine storm, is more prominent in younger people with good immunological status,” Dr Shamsher Dwivedee, chairman neurosciences and director of clinical services at Vimhans Nayati Super Specialty hospital, said. He added that early administration of anti-viral and steroids can prevent such complications.

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