Specialists in Israel continue to see post-illness symptoms affecting quality of life even in young, healthy patients.
It’s nice to believe that the SARS-CoV-2 virus is gone for good, but with each passing week, the World Health Organization’s (WHO) coronavirus dashboard records millions of new confirmed cases of COVID-19.
And if COVID is still among the people, so will the Prolonged COVID.
According to the WHO, between 10 and 20 percent of COVID-19 survivors have persistent symptoms such as fatigue, shortness of breath, joint pain, decreased taste or smell, and difficulty concentrating.
Recently, Dr. Anthony Fauci, now chief medical adviser to US President Joe Biden, declared that prolonged COVID was an “insidious public health emergency.”
A study published by the Maccabi Israel Health Service found that among adults who have suffered from COVID-19, one in three have persistent health deficits, such as memory loss and body aches. Even a semester later.
Meanwhile, specialists in Israel studying how to prevent and treat COVID have found out vaccines can help people avoid it and that treatments with hyperbaric oxygenphysical therapy or a nutraceutical supplement can help stop it.
Additionally, the vaccine may prevent COVID in the long term while oxygen could help treat it.
“We still see every day in hospitals and clinics post-COVID patients complaining of symptoms even months to a year or more after recovering from their illness,” said Dr. Gabriel Izbicki, director of the Pulmonary Institute at Shaare Zedek Medical Center in Jerusalem.
According to Izbicki, these are a minority of COVID patients but “it’s scary because there’s no way of knowing who will be affected by a sustained release.”
Another study by pulmonologists at Hadassah University Medical Center found that although severe COVID-19 increases the risk of lasting respiratory, cardiac, or neurological impairment, nonspecific symptoms such as shortness of breath and fatigue are just as common later on. when the disease is milder.
How can vaccination help?
Epidemiologist Michael Edelstein of Bar-Ilan University said there was a growing consensus that vaccines could help prevent COVID in the long term.
His research showed that people who had previously received at least two doses of the Pfizer vaccine reported 62% less fatigue, 50% fewer headaches, 62% less weakness in the extremities, and 66% less muscle pain after COVID-19 compared to those who have not been inoculated.
Thus, the vaccine may prevent prolonged COVID while oxygen could help treat it
Several current studies by Edelstein focus, as he himself said, “showing that prolonged COVID significantly affects people’s well-being and quality of life and that it lasts a long time”.
Edelstein told ISRAEL21c en Español that he measured the effect of sustained COVID-19 symptoms on subjective well-being (BS) in 2,295 study participants three to six months, six to 12 months, and 12 to 18 months after the ‘infection.
“The results suggest that the largest and most sustained changes in SB result from non-specific symptoms, including fatigue, confusion/lack of concentration, and sleep disturbances,” said the scientist.
Specific symptoms such as muscle weakness and pain had a less profound and more temporary effect on SB.
“Taking a similar approach for other symptoms and following people over time to describe trends in BS changes attributable to specific symptoms will help understand the post-acute phase of COVID-19 and how it should be better defined and managed,” Edelstein explained. .
Treatment of prolonged COVID
Hospitals in Israel have opened some of the world’s first post-COVID clinics, where treatment depends on symptoms and severity.
Researchers from Ariel University and Sheba Medical Center have published a study suggesting that autoimmune dysfunction may play a major role in long-lasting symptoms of COVID-19 such as chronic fatigue, cognitive decline and related mood disorders, among many others . .
Furthermore, the scientists described that some patients benefit from immunomodulatory and immunosuppressive therapy, but that physical therapy may be safer and more effective because it stabilizes the autonomic nervous system.
Some time ago, Tel Aviv University specialists teamed up with a long-term COVID clinic in Florida, USA to formulate a unique nutraceutical supplement to treat typical long-term symptoms.
The results of their clinical trial revealed an improvement in symptom severity in 51 patients, particularly mental confusion and fatigue, after two weeks of daily dosing, and an even greater improvement after four weeks of daily dosing.
For more serious patients with other severe or post-COVID lung symptoms, Izbicki prescribes steroids to reduce inflammation.
For his part, Dr. Fares Darawshy, a Hadassah pulmonologist, agreed that the most helpful treatment in these cases is respiratory, physical or cognitive therapy.
Intensive hyperbaric oxygen therapy (HBO) is another therapeutic option, albeit less accessible today.
Last July, research published by the Sagol Center for Hyperbaric Medicine and Research at Shamir Medical Center and Tel Aviv University reported that HBO critically improved the condition of 37 post-COVID patients compared with a group control. .
Under the supervision of the director of the Sagol Center, Dr. Shai Efrati, these patients received 40 HBO treatments, five sessions a week for two months.
“The study revealed that hyperbaric oxygen can induce structural and functional repair of damaged brain regions and improve cognitive, behavioral and emotional function in unfortunate patients suffering from post-COVID-19 conditions,” Efrati said.
Prevention is the best medicine
As researchers in Israel and around the world try to understand more about why COVID-19 often causes lingering symptoms, Izbicki cautioned that the best protection against prolonged COVID is to avoid getting infected in the first place.
“Even if it’s not pretty, we should continue to take precautions and wear masks indoors to protect ourselves, our parents and grandparents,” Izbicki said.
The specialist added that people can remain positive for COVID for a long time, even weeks after recovering.
And that anyone can be infected more than once. “We can live more or less normal lives, but we just have to be a little more careful,” she concluded.
Source: ISRAEL21c
