If we already knew that the Covid-19 had harmful effects on the brain, a new study British just assessed theimpact of hospitalization for a severe form on cognitive decline. Conducted by researchers at the University of Cambridge and published in the journal eClinicalMedicinethe study claims that being hospitalized with Covid-19 could age the brain by 20 years, and would correspond to a loss of 10 IQ points. This accelerated aging could be due to reduced oxygen to the brain caused by the virus, or inflammation of brain tissue, the researchers say.
The researchers tested the cognitive abilities of 46 patients with an average age of 51 who were hospitalized after contracting Covid-19 between March and July 2020, six months after being discharged from hospital. A third of these patients were hooked up to ventilators while in hospital.
Their answers to a series of memory, attention and reasoning tests were compared to those of 66,000 healthy people from the general public. And the results showed that people hospitalized with severe Covid-19 were less precise and slower than people in the control group. They also performed very poorly on tests where they had to find words, due to “brain fog”, a symptom often reported by patients with long Covid.
Some patients may never recover their intelligence
And according to the study, the disease severity may be a determining factor in cognitive decline : patients who were connected to a ventilator during their hospitalization are those who obtained the worst scores at the end of the tests.
According to the researchers, the cognitive impairment observed in patients hospitalized with Covid-19 was similar to that of people aged 50 to 70. And while some showed “gradual” cognitive improvement, others may never regain their cognitive abilities.
“We followed some patients up to ten months after their acute infection, so we could see very slow improvement. Although not statistically significant, at least it goes in the right direction, but it is very possible that some of these people will never fully recover.“, concludes Professor David Menon, neuroscientist and lead author of the study.
Source :
- Multivariate profile and acute-phase correlates of cognitive deficits in a Covid-19 hospitalized cohort, eClinicalMedicineMay 2022
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