• About Us
  • Contact Us
  • Cookie policy (EU)
  • Home
  • Privacy Policy
  • Video
  • Write for us
Today Headline
  • HOME
  • NEWS
    • POLITICS
    • News for today
    • Borisov news
  • FINANCE
    • Business
    • Insurance
  • Video
  • TECHNOLOGY
  • ENTERPRISE
  • LIFESTYLE
    • TRAVEL
    • HEALTH
    • ENTERTAINMENT
  • AUTOMOTIVE
  • SPORTS
  • Travel and Tourism
  • HOME
  • NEWS
    • POLITICS
    • News for today
    • Borisov news
  • FINANCE
    • Business
    • Insurance
  • Video
  • TECHNOLOGY
  • ENTERPRISE
  • LIFESTYLE
    • TRAVEL
    • HEALTH
    • ENTERTAINMENT
  • AUTOMOTIVE
  • SPORTS
  • Travel and Tourism
No Result
View All Result
TodayHeadline
No Result
View All Result

Cognitive Impact of Severe COVID Is Equivalent to 20 Years of Aging, Study Finds – ScienceAlert

May 4, 2022
in Health
0
Cognitive Impact of Severe COVID Is Equivalent to 20 Years of Aging, Study Finds – ScienceAlert
0
SHARES
1
VIEWS
Share on FacebookShare on Twitter

We all know that COVID-19 can lead to lingering fatigue and brain fog. But one of the most rigorous examinations to date of the long-term cognitive impacts of severe infection has just yielded some pretty unsettling results.

 

In a study comparing 46 severe COVID-19 patients with 460 matched controls, researchers found the mental impacts of severe COVID-19 six months later can be the equivalent to aging 20 years – going from 50 to 70 years old – or losing 10 IQ points.

The specific mental changes were also distinct to those seen in early dementia or general aging.

“Cognitive impairment is common to a wide range of neurological disorders, including dementia, and even routine aging, but the patterns we saw – the cognitive ‘fingerprint’ of COVID-19 – was distinct from all of these,” says neuroscientist David Menon from the University of Cambridge in the UK, who was senior author of the study.

The new paper doesn’t set out to alarm the many of us who’ve already had COVID, but instead investigate more closely how serious the cognitive changes are following severe cases of the infection, so we can begin to understand how to mitigate them. 

“Tens of thousands of people have been through intensive care with COVID-19 in England alone and many more will have been very sick, but not admitted to hospital,” says lead researcher and cognitive scientist Adam Hampshire from Imperial College London.

 

“This means there are a large number of people out there still experiencing problems with cognition many months later. We urgently need to look at what can be done to help these people.”

The experiment involved 46 people who’d gone to Addenbrooke’s Hospital in Cambridge as a result of COVID-19 between March and July 2020. Sixteen of them were put on mechanical ventilation during their stay.

An average of six months after their infection, researchers supervised them using a testing tool called Cognitron to see how they were doing in areas such as memory, attention, reasoning, as well as anxiety, depression, and post-traumatic stress disorder.

The researchers didn’t have test results from before these individuals fell ill with COVID to compare to. Instead they did the next best thing, and compared their results against a matched control group of 460 people.

These results were then mapped to see how far they deviated from expected scores for their age and demographic, based on 66,008 members of the general public.

The results showed that those who’d survived severe COVID were less accurate and had slower response times than the general public.

 

The magnitude of cognitive loss was similar to the effects of aging between 50 and 70 years of age – and equivalent to losing 10 IQ points.

Accuracy in verbal analogy tasks – where people are asked to find similarities between words – was most impacted. This mirrors anecdotal reports that suggest people post-infection are struggling to find the right word, and feeling like their brain is in slow motion.

Interestingly, even though patients reported varying levels of fatigue and depression, the severity of the initial infection, rather than the survivor’s current mental health, could best predict the cognitive outcome, the team found.

“These results indicate that although both fatigue and mental health are prominent chronic [consequences] of COVID-19, their severity is likely to be somewhat independent from the observed cognitive deficits,” the researchers write in their paper.

The somewhat good news is that, upon follow up, there were some signs of recovery – but it was gradual at best. 

“We followed some patients up as late as ten months after their acute infection, so were able to see a very slow improvement,” says Menon.

 

“While this was not statistically significant, it is at least heading in the right direction, but it is very possible that some of these individuals will never fully recover.”

This study only looked at the more extreme end of hospitalized patients, but there are plenty of other studies showing that even ‘mild’ cases can cause similar cognitive impacts.

What’s still not fully understood is why and how the SARS-CoV-2 virus causes this cognitive decline.   

Previous research has shown that during severe COVID, the brain decreases glucose consumption in the frontoparietal network, which is involved in attention, problem solving, and working memory. It’s also known that the virus can directly affect the brain. 

But the researchers suggest the likely culprit isn’t direct infection, but a combination of factors: including reduced oxygen or blood supply to the brain; clotting of vessels; and microscopic bleeds.

There’s also mounting evidence that the body’s own immune and inflammatory response may be having a significant impact on the brain.

“Future work will be focused on mapping these cognitive deficits to underlying neural pathologies and inflammatory biomarkers, and to longitudinally track recovery into the chronic phase,” the researchers write.

Until then, take comfort in the fact that if you’re still feeling slow and foggy months after recovering from COVID-19, you are most certainly not alone.

The research has been published in eClinical Medicine.

 

Previous Post

Disease detectives see clues in viral hepatitis cases in kids – STAT

Next Post

This Is Exactly How Anxiety Can Harm Your Gut Microbiome, From A Therapist – mindbodygreen.com

Related Posts

This Take On The Mediterranean Diet May Be Even Better For You – mindbodygreen.com
Health

This Take On The Mediterranean Diet May Be Even Better For You – mindbodygreen.com

https://www.mindbodygreen.com/articles/mediterranean-keto-diet

Read more
Spain, Portugal report monkeypox cases, raising specter of wider outbreak – STAT
Health

Spain, Portugal report monkeypox cases, raising specter of wider outbreak – STAT

https://www.statnews.com/2022/05/18/spain-portugal-report-monkeypox-cases-raising-specter-of-wider-outbreak/

Read more
Limited cross-variant immunity from SARS-CoV-2 Omicron without vaccination – Nature.com
Health

Limited cross-variant immunity from SARS-CoV-2 Omicron without vaccination – Nature.com

https://www.nature.com/articles/s41586-022-04865-0

Read more
Monkeypox: What we know about the smallpox-like virus spreading in the UK, Portugal and Spain – Euronews
Health

Monkeypox: What we know about the smallpox-like virus spreading in the UK, Portugal and Spain – Euronews

https://www.euronews.com/next/2022/05/18/monkeypox-what-we-know-so-far-about-the-smallpox-like-virus-detected-in-the-uk

Read more
Ohio health leaders address rising COVID cases – WJW FOX 8 News Cleveland
Health

Ohio health leaders address rising COVID cases – WJW FOX 8 News Cleveland

https://fox8.com/news/coronavirus/ohio-health-leaders-to-address-rising-covid-cases/

Read more
Load More
Next Post
This Is Exactly How Anxiety Can Harm Your Gut Microbiome, From A Therapist – mindbodygreen.com

This Is Exactly How Anxiety Can Harm Your Gut Microbiome, From A Therapist - mindbodygreen.com

  • Trending
  • Comments
  • Latest
Head of Luhansk Oblast Military Administration: Russians already scared to advance on Bilohorivka and no longer force their way across Siverskyi Donets – Yahoo News

Head of Luhansk Oblast Military Administration: Russians already scared to advance on Bilohorivka and no longer force their way across Siverskyi Donets – Yahoo News

Horror as goat gives birth to ‘humanoid kid’ with baby-like face

Six times actors really romped in sex scenes that make 365 DNI look tame

Six times actors really romped in sex scenes that make 365 DNI look tame

Ex-porn star Lana Rhoades flaunts 2.5st weight loss two weeks after giving birth

Ex-porn star Lana Rhoades flaunts 2.5st weight loss two weeks after giving birth

VIDEO: Planting Bush Clematis, Ornamental Oregano and a Bloomerang Lilac Tree!

VIDEO: Planting Bush Clematis, Ornamental Oregano and a Bloomerang Lilac Tree!

Solar Orbiter spies a hedgehog during close pass of the sun – CNN

Solar Orbiter spies a hedgehog during close pass of the sun – CNN

Kansas Supreme Court upholds Republican congressional map – POLITICO

Kansas Supreme Court upholds Republican congressional map – POLITICO

Read Taylor Swift’s Inspiring Speech for NYU’s Class of ’22 – Rolling Stone

Read Taylor Swift’s Inspiring Speech for NYU’s Class of ’22 – Rolling Stone

About Us

Todayheadline the independent news and topics discovery
A home-grown and independent news and topic aggregation . displays breaking news linking to news websites all around the world.

Follow Us

Latest News

VIDEO: Planting Bush Clematis, Ornamental Oregano and a Bloomerang Lilac Tree!

VIDEO: Planting Bush Clematis, Ornamental Oregano and a Bloomerang Lilac Tree!

Solar Orbiter spies a hedgehog during close pass of the sun – CNN

Solar Orbiter spies a hedgehog during close pass of the sun – CNN

VIDEO: Planting Bush Clematis, Ornamental Oregano and a Bloomerang Lilac Tree!

VIDEO: Planting Bush Clematis, Ornamental Oregano and a Bloomerang Lilac Tree!

Solar Orbiter spies a hedgehog during close pass of the sun – CNN

Solar Orbiter spies a hedgehog during close pass of the sun – CNN

Kansas Supreme Court upholds Republican congressional map – POLITICO

Kansas Supreme Court upholds Republican congressional map – POLITICO

  • Real Estate
  • Education
  • Parenting
  • Cooking
  • Travel and Tourism
  • Home & Garden
  • Pets
  • Privacy & Policy
  • Contact
  • About

© 2021 All rights are reserved Todayheadline

No Result
View All Result
  • Real Estate
  • Education
  • Parenting
  • Cooking
  • Travel and Tourism
  • Home & Garden
  • Pets
  • Privacy & Policy
  • Contact
  • About

© 2021 All rights are reserved Todayheadline

Welcome Back!

Login to your account below

Forgotten Password?

Retrieve your password

Please enter your username or email address to reset your password.

Log In

Add New Playlist

Posting....