- Recent studies show that coronavirus infection can cause long-term symptoms affecting multiple organs.
- Shortness of breath, fatigue, and “brain fog” are among the most common symptoms of long COVID.
- Research into the mechanisms of long COVID and possible treatments is ongoing.
Infection with the novel coronavirus could lead to long-term problems in the small airways of the lungs, even in people who had a mild infection, say researchers.
这增加了越来越多的挥之不去的症状和并发症，这些症状和并发症可能会在冠状病毒感染后发生 - 统称为长期covid。
Shortness of breath, fatigue, and “brain fog” are among the most common symptoms of long COVID.
对于某些人来说，症状在初次感染后继续存在。对于其他人来说，并发症可能几周或几个月后出现。
Research into the mechanisms of long COVID and possible treatments are ongoing.
在最近的另一个研究中,另一组研究rchers examined the effect that coronavirus infection has on the brain. And other researchers are testing new treatments for heart-related symptoms of long COVID.
In a学习published March 15 in the journal Radiology, researchers used CT imaging to examine the lungs of 100 adults who had COVID-19 and continued to have symptoms for at least 30 days after their diagnosis.
Researchers compared the CT findings of these participants with those from a group of 106 healthy participants.
Participants who had COVID-19 — even if not hospitalized for it — were more likely to have signs of damage in the small airways of the lungs compared with healthy participants.
“在小型气道中发生了一些疾病，独立于19号的严重程度，”研究作者Dr. Alejandro P. Comellas, a pulmonologist and professor of internal medicine at the Carver College of Medicine at the University of Iowa, said in a新闻发布。“We need to investigate further to see whether it is transient or more permanent.”
The COVID-19 group included 67 people who were never hospitalized, 17 who were hospitalized but not in the intensive care unit, and 16 who were treated in the ICU.
长期相互交往的人中最常见的症状是呼吸困难，疲劳和咳嗽。
一个mong the hospitalized group, almost 35 percent showed signs of air trapping in their lungs on their CT scans, compared with 7.2 percent of the healthy participants.
一个round 25 percent of患有冠状病毒但未住院的参与者有空气捕获的迹象。
空气诱捕是人们在呼吸时无法完全清空肺部的条件。这发生在慢性阻塞性肺疾病（COPD），哮喘和其他阻塞性气道疾病中。
Of the nine people who had a CT scan done more than 200 days after their COVID-19 diagnosis, eight still had air trapping in their lungs.
一个separate analysis of the CT images showed evidence of small airways disease related to ongoing inflammation in the lungs or fibrosis. The latter is a condition in which the lung tissue becomes damaged and scarred.
Researchers will continue to follow the participants to see whether their lung function improves or if symptoms persist.
Comellas说：“如果一部分患者继续患有小气道疾病，那么我们需要考虑其背后的机制。”
“It could be something related to inflammation that’s reversible, or it may be something related to a scar that is irreversible, and then we need to look at ways to prevent further progression of the disease,” he said.
“大脑雾”是长期互联的另一种常见症状，但这并不是人们唯一的神经症状。
一个
芭芭拉·汉森（Barbara Hanson）博士，研究员Ken & Ruth Davee Department of Neurology在西北大学费恩伯格医学院（Feinberg School of Medicine）中说，长期相关的神经系统并发症的严重程度各不相同。
汉森说：“我们有一些患者似乎因其症状而严重衰弱，尤其是认知症状。”“我们有一些患者在写作和阅读，维护时间表以及从事以前从事的工作很难。”
“Then there are others who may just feel a little fatigued. While some of that could be cognitive symptoms showing up, it mostly just presents as fatigue,” she added.
一个s with other symptoms of long COVID, Hanson said neurological complications can occur in people who only had a relatively mild initial infection, meaning they were not hospitalized.
“The experience of long COVID is not dependent on any of the symptoms at the beginning of the acute infection,” she said.
This was the case in a学习that Hanson and her colleagues published March 7 in the journal Neurology: Neuroimmunology & Neuroinflammation.
“People who had mild to moderate COVID-19 had exactly the same outcomes [as people with more severe COVID-19] when they developed long COVID,” she said. “In fact, they had a greater number of symptoms and they had the subjective experience that they have not gotten better.”
In this study, researchers measured certain biomarkers related to the health of the brain, including one that indicates there has been damage to neurons.
一个nother biomarker shows activation of supporting cells in the brain known as “glial cells.” These cells are elevated in multiple sclerosis and other diseases of the brain.
研究人员将这些生物标志物措施结合在一起，提出了“神经元评分”。
这项研究有64名参与者，其中包括为Covid-19的住院治疗的人，他们患有急性脑功能障碍，称为脑病，患有长期Covid的人从未因Covid-19的住院而住院，以及来自社区的健康人。
研究人员发现，神经元的评分与长期共同患者的焦虑相关 - 患有焦虑症状的人的神经元评分较高。
当研究人员考虑参与者的年龄，性别和体重指数，以及研究人员使用不同的焦虑措施时，该协会坚持不懈。
Hanson said this suggests there is a “true relationship” between the two.
For people with long COVID, their symptoms are very real to them. But because long COVID is not just one illness but many separate conditions, people may have difficulty getting an accurate diagnosis.
Being able to point to a biomarker that is correlated with a symptom of long COVID such as anxiety may offer some level of comfort.
“很验证生物备份that shows, ‘Yes, we can see from markers in your blood that it looks as if you are likely experiencing anxiety as a result of long COVID,” said Hanson.
但是，她警告说，这些生物标志物目前并不是长期共同的“测试”。尽管如此，她说，他们还提供了对长期共同的一个方面的更深入的见解。
疾病控制与预防中心（CDC）估计
This wide range is due in part to a lack of long-term studies and a lack of agreement over how todefine and diagnose long COVID。
However, many studies continue to show that certain symptoms are more common in long COVID.
最近
David B. Landers博士, an interventional cardiologist with Hackensack Meridian Health’s Hackensack University Medical Center, said fast heart rate, shortness of breath, and fatigue are the major symptoms in long COVID patients that he sees in his clinic.
“There is a wide range of severity,” he said. “Some people can’t walk 100 feet, and other people have symptoms intermittently, such as only when they’re doing something that requires a great deal of exertion.”
While some of his patients had severe illness with their initial coronavirus infection, others only had mild symptoms.
一个nd by mild, he means people were not hospitalized for COVID-19. They may, however, have felt very sick during their initial infection, with symptoms such as headaches, fatigue, cough, and nasal congestion.
In addition, “we’ve seen a number of cases in which the patient was asymptomatic,” Landers said. “But their symptoms are so terribly consistent with long COVID that we believe, in fact, that they had a coronavirus infection which was largely asymptomatic.”
Landers和他的同事最近开始让人们加入学习这是评估使用β受体阻滞剂作为长期互联的一种治疗方法。这类药物可以降低心脏和血管的压力。
While he said these drugs seem to produce improvement in long COVID patients in his clinic, the study will measure these improvements in a more structured fashion.
他说：“这将使我们能够以更大的担保人的工作方式说。”
随着科学家对长期的共同研究有了更多的了解，并进行了更多的治疗研究，长期共同的人将有更多选择来帮助他们变得更好。
For some people, given enough time and proper medical support, their outlook is good.
兰德斯说：“有很多人患有这种综合症。”“但是我们可以提供一些鼓励，从许多人随着时间的流逝往往会变得更好。”