The long-term effects of neoconiosis on people are still largely unknown, and a new study in the Jan. 9 issue of The Lancet followed 1,733 patients with neoconiosis who had been hospitalized at Wuhan Jinyintan Hospital in early 2020.
The study found that 76 percent still had at least one symptom six months after diagnosis of neocon, including muscle weakness, fatigue and sleep disturbances, and other psychological symptoms such as anxiety and depression were also common. In addition, the article noted that patients had lower antibody levels six months later than at the beginning of the infection and were at risk for reinfection.
Between the beginning of January and the end of May 2020, a total of 2,469 newly crowned patients were discharged from Wuhan Jinyintan Hospital, and 1,733 newly crowned patients were recruited for this study. The remaining 736 were unable to participate in follow-up due to death before follow-up, psychiatric disease or Alzheimer’s disease, readmission, limited physical mobility due to other diseases, and refusal.
The median age of these 1733 discharged patients was 57 years. The study was conducted from June to early September 2020, a median of 186 days, or about six months, before the patients’ new coronary symptoms appeared.
Researchers assessed patients’ physical and mental health through face-to-face questionnaires, physical exams (major organ function tests), blood tests and a six-minute walking test. The researchers also performed lung function tests on 390 of them. In addition, 94 people were tested for antibody levels at the time of peak infection, and in this follow-up study, the researchers analyzed how their antibody levels changed.
Results showed that 76 percent of patients reported still having at least one symptom, 63 percent reported still having fatigue or muscle weakness, and 26 percent had sleep disturbances, while 23 percent had symptoms of anxiety or depression. There was an overlap of symptoms in these populations, meaning that a recovering patient may have multiple health problems at the same time.
Of the 348 former patients who completed pulmonary function tests, the previously seriously ill patients showed signs of reduced lung function. More than half (56%) of the critically ill patients in the study in grades 5 to 6 (i.e., requiring a ventilator) had a reduced ability of the lungs to deliver oxygen to the blood. This figure was 29% of patients in grade 4 (requiring oxygen) and 22% of patients in grade 3 (not requiring oxygen).
In the walking test (a test that measures the distance walked in 6 minutes), 29% of the previous grade 5 to 6 patients did not meet the standard, compared to 24% of grade 4 patients and 22% of grade 3 patients.
The effects of New Coronary Pneumonia on other organs were also seen in follow-up studies. The researchers found that 13 percent of the 822 patients who did not develop acute kidney injury during their hospitalization had decreased kidney function after discharge.
And a major concern, whether having had a new crown eliminates the need to worry about re-infection with the virus, has been answered. Ninety-four people in the study were tested for blood antibodies and their neutralizing antibody levels dropped by 52.5 percent compared to the peak of the infection, meaning they were still at some risk of being reinfected.
Wuhan Jinyintan Hospital had admitted a large number of critically ill and critically ill new crown patients during the outbreak in early 2020. According to a press release in The Lancet, one of the authors of the study, Professor Bin Cao of China-Japan Friendship Hospital and Capital Medical University, said that the “new” disease of neoconiosis The long-term effects on patients are only beginning to emerge, and many patients continue to suffer from multiple sequelae after discharge, especially in severe cases. Therefore, researchers still need to conduct long-term follow-up studies in the future to better understand the impact of NCCP on humans.
Monica Cortinovis et al. from the Istituto Mario Negri (Italy) Institute of Pharmacology commented in The Lancet that this study provides timely and useful information, as there are few studies on the sequelae of neoconviruses. However, the study tracked a small sample of critically ill patients in the population, with only 4% of ICU patients. Cases in this population have previously shown significant impairment in cognitive function, mental health and physical function, making recovery after discharge from the hospital difficult. Future studies could perhaps focus more on expanding the representativeness of the sample.
In contrast, the participants in this study were all discharged patients from Jinyintan Hospital with more severe disease. And how does the long-term health impact of neoconiosis differ between patients with severe disease and those with mild disease (e.g., in a square pod hospital)? Are there differences in the follow-up effects between patients admitted to hospital and those isolated at home? More research is needed.
The investigators also mention in the paper that further knowledge is needed regarding the trend of blood antibodies over time. In addition, further quantification of the impact of neocoronary pneumonia is needed due to individual limitations in lung function and physiological testing in infected patients.
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