What are the other effects of COVID 19?
Over the past few months, we have all become experts in virology whether by choice or not. However, while we are all used to the idea that Covid-19 can lead to a fever, cough and loss of taste and smell, researchers are starting to identify other important effects on your physical and mental health.
Covid-19 has been living amongst us for over a year already and as we continue to learn more about the virus itself, researchers are also starting to identify surprising health effects that this virus appears to be causing. One of the most recent studies analysed a group of 62,000 patient records, all who had survived Covid-19. The researchers concluded that of the survivors, there was a sharp rise in psychiatric disorders in this population as well as dementia and insomnia. They noted that this group were more likely to suffer anxiety disorders as part of these psychiatric disorders.
Supporting these findings, Adam Hampshire and his team at Imperial College London, analysed records from 84,000 individuals and concluded that, Covid-19 can lead to chronic cognitive consequences altering subjects’ abilities to complete puzzles and select the correct words (tests used in Alzheimer patients). They state that Covid-19 can cause a decline in brain function equivalent to 10-years of brain ageing.
Importantly however, at the current time with research trials and studies growing exponentially in the area of Covid-19, one has to be a little careful extrapolating data conclusions especially as studies are being conducted without stringent peer-review in order to expedite their publications. Despite this however, it seems that research trends are showing that outcomes from Covid-19 can have deleterious effects on mental health and brain function.
References:
https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2020.10.20.20215863v1
Author: Dr. Adam Greenfield, Co-founder of WorkLifeWell | Doctor of Chiropractic | Wellness Specialist
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