The COVID-19 epidemic has gradually declined in 2023, but for clinicians, perhaps the next issue is the highlight! Why do you say that? Newly published in 2023 in the heavyweight journal "eClinicalMedicine"paper, we can get a glimpse of it and explain it to you below.
First of all, we know that cognitive dysfunction will appear after some infectious diseases, and infection with COVID-19 is also a possible cause. However, because COVID-19 is a new type of infectious disease, relevant information is lacking, so the UK The research team hopes to learn more about this part through database analysis.
The research team conducted two rounds of online cognitive surveys in July-August 2021 and April-June 2022 on 3,335 participants in the British Human Biodatabase on COVID-19 symptoms.test, the testing methods used have been verified and have high reliability, mainly testing memory, attention, reasoning ability, and motor control. A total of 3,335 participants completed the first round of testing, and by the second round of testing, 1,768 of the participants who completed the first round of testing also completed this round of testing.
After correcting for potential interfering factors and mediating variables and using linear regression analysis, the research team made several important findings:
1. In the first round of test results, participants who had been diagnosed with COVID-19 had worse cognitive performance than those who had not been diagnosed. Among them, patients whose symptoms lasted for more than 12 weeks after diagnosis had the most obvious cognitive impairment. .
2. In the second round of testing results, the cognitive performance of participants in each group did not change significantly over time, which means that participants who scored lower in the first round (with obvious cognitive impairment) Cognitive function has not improved the following year.
3. Cognitive impairment only exists in participants who feel they have not recovered from the epidemic. For participants who feel they have recovered, there is no measurable cognitive impairment.
Based on the above, the author feels that there is a lot of information worthy of everyone's vigilance. First, unlike most respiratory diseases,The cognitive sequelae of COVID-19 are longer-lasting than imagined, may also mean other potential COVID-19 symptoms (such as:Abnormal sense of taste and smell) does not heal easily on its own, so if you doubt yourselfIf you have chronic COVID-19 symptoms, it is recommended to seek professional medical assistance as soon as possible, to prevent symptoms from persisting for a long time and affecting health and life; in addition, considering that cognitive function only exists in participants who feel that they have not recovered from the epidemic, the author believes that perhaps their positive thoughts about their physical condition can also help It is easier to recover from COVID-19 symptoms, which in some ways echoes the theory that body, mind and soul influence each other. Finally, I wish everyone a healthy and happy life~!
〈The author is former Attending Physician in National Taiwan University Hospital, and Master of Science from National Taiwan University〉