Researchers Find Adverse Effects of COVID-19 Outside the Lungs

Researchers, in a new study, recently presented the first comprehensive review of the impacts of COVID-19 outside the lungs.

In the said study, the scientists found that a considerable proportion of patients encounter brain, heart, and kidney damage. They also suggested that doctors should treat the mentioned conditions along with respiratory illness.

The said review, conducted by a team of researchers at the Columbia University Irving Medical Center, as mentioned, is the first-ever extensive assessment of the impacts of COVID-19 on all affected organs outside the lungs.

When the pandemic was just starting, in early March, there were not many clinical tests on the non-respiratory impacts of the infectious disease. Thus, the group of expert observers decided to merge the results from studies that were just starting to appear in the works with the doctors who were learning from experience.

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Damages outside the Lungs

Based on the review, one set of problems resulted from COVID-19 comprises inflammation, blood clots, and an immune system in overdrive.

The researchers thought such clotting complications could stem from the attack of the virus on cells lining blood vessels.

Findings indicated that once the virus hits the blood vessels cells, the infection rises, and blood starts forming clots in both big and small sizes.

In addition, such blood clots become capable of traveling throughout the body and cause disorder on organs, spreading a vicious thrombo-inflammation cycle.

Heart Impairment

Another problem seen is heart impairment or damage. According to medical research, clots can lead to heart attacks. The virus can attack the heart though, in many other ways, the team of researchers said.

Essentially, the heart impairment's mechanism is the review indicated, is presently not clear as the virus has not been often secluded from the heart tissue, specifically in autopsy circumstances.

More so, the muscle of the heart may be impaired by infection and the so-called accompanying cytokine release.

This is a flood of immune cells, typically clearing up infested cells, lead uncontrollably to severe cases of COVID-19.

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Kidney Impairment

One more unexpected finding, when it comes to the harm COVID-19 can bring outside the lungs, is the one pertaining to the kidney. 

The review found that a high proportion of COVID-19 patients in the intensive care unit had acute kidney damage. Studies conducted in China indicated renal problems.

However, in New York City, clinicians found renal failure in about half the total number of patients staying in the ICU. 

The said percentage was an equivalent of five to 10 percent of patients required dialysis, which, according to the team, was quite a high number.

Nevertheless, the data about long-term renal impairment is presently missing, although a considerable proportion of patients will possibly go on to necessitate dialysis permanently.

The group found too that neurological indications like dizziness, exhaustion, headache, and loss of smell may take place in about one-third of the patients.

More alarming problems were also found in the said review, and these included strokes as results of blood clots, which may take place in up to six percent of severe cases and delirium in up to nine percent of the severe cases.

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