Persistence of symptoms after improvement of acute COVID19 infection, a longitudinal study

Mona Mohammed Abdelrahman, Noha Mohammed Abd-Elrahman, Tasneem Mohammed Bakheet, Mona Mohammed Abdelrahman, Noha Mohammed Abd-Elrahman, Tasneem Mohammed Bakheet

Abstract

With the number of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) infected patients increasing all over the world, a large number of survivors have reported changes in their quality of life or experienced re-infection. So, we aimed to detect the percentage, type, and risk factors of persistent symptoms after improvement from acute COVID-19 infection and to detect the percentage of COVID-19 re-infection and degree of severity of the second infection. One hundred seventy-two (59 male, 113 female) patients who tested positive for severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) were followed up via mobile phone every 2 months for 8 to 10 months. After recovery, 105 patients (61%) (30 male, 75 female) reported one or more COVID-19 persistent symptoms. Fatigue, dyspnea, and depression were the most common persistent symptoms representing 37.3%, 22%, 22%, respectively. We found that age was independently related to the persistence of symptoms. During the follow-up, six females (3.5%) had laboratory-confirmed COVID-19 re-infection. Their mean age was 35.7 ± 11 years. The mean interval from the complete recovery of the first infection to the onset of the second one was 53 ± 22.2 days and ranged from 30 to 90 days. The second infection was milder in severity than the first infection in 83.33% of cases. There was a high percentage of patients who complained of persistent symptoms after recovery from COVID-19. Fatigue and headache were the most common persistent symptoms. Age was considered a risk factor for persistent symptoms. Re-infection with SARS-CoV-2 can occur after recovery.

Trial registration: ClinicalTrials.gov NCT04764773.

Keywords: COVID-19; SARS-CoV-2; persistent symptoms; re-infection; risk factors.

Conflict of interest statement

The authors declare that there are no conflicts of interest.

© 2021 Wiley Periodicals LLC.

Figures

Figure 1
Figure 1
Acute symptoms of 172 COVID‐19 patients. COVID‐19, coronavirus disease 2019

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Source: PubMed

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