Facing chest pain during Long Covid? Heart inflammation is the answer, finds study
Premium- Long Covid includes a wide range of ongoing health problems, which can last for days, weeks, and even months after one is diagnosed Covid negative.
Even as the scare of coronavirus has reduced owing to reduced reported fatal cases, the threat of Long Covid still looms at large. There is an ever increasing boom of symptoms patients, suffering from Long Covid, have complained of. This varied range of symptoms include persistent heart complaints such aspoor exercise tolerance, palpitations or chest pain. These complains have risen even though the Covid infection was mild.
A recently conducted study has shown that the underlying cause for the same could be heart inflammation. Earlier studies, predominantly among young, physically fit individuals, were already able to show that mild cardiac inflammation can occur after Covid-19.
Let us understand
What is Long Covid?
Long Covid refers to the long-term effects of the SARS-CoV-2, which causes coronavirus infection in the body. According to the US-based Centre for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), it includes a wide range of ongoing health problems, which can last for days, weeks, and even months after one is diagnosed Covid negative.
Symptoms of Long Covid
-Fatigue
-Loss of smell
-Muscle aches
-Brain fog
-Chest pain or tightness
-Insomnia
-Heart palpitations
-Dizziness
-Pins and needles
-Joint pain
-Depression and anxiety
-Tinnitus, earaches
-Headaches
-Rashes
The study
A team of medical scientists led by Dr Valentina Puntmann and Professor Eike Nagel from the Institute for Experimental and Translational Cardiovascular Imaging at University Hospital Frankfurt followed up 346 people – half of them women – between the age of 18 and 77 years, in each case around four and eleven months after the documented SARS-CoV-2 infection.
The team had also analysed the study participants' blood, conducted heart MRIs, and recorded and graded their symptoms using standardised questionnaires.
Findings
73% reported heart problems at the beginning of the study and in 57% these symptoms persisted 11 months after the SARS-CoV-2 infection.
The research team measured mild but persistent heart inflammation that was not accompanied by structural changes in the heart. Blood levels of troponin – a protein that enters the blood when the heart muscle is damaged – were also unremarkable.
Chest pain during Long Covid
The research found that even if people suffered from mild Covid-19 infection, they remained susceptible to heart inflammation or cardiac inflammation. This led to severe chest pain, poor exercise tolerance, palpitations.
Researcher Dr Puntmann explains that the chest inflammation remains an effect of virus triggered autoimmune process. The clinical picture is more reminiscent, she says, of the findings in chronic diffuse inflammatory syndromes such as autoimmune conditions. She also insisted that the tachycardiac condition are significantly different from classic viral myocarditis.
“Although most likely driven by a virus-triggered autoimmune process, a lot more research is needed in order to understand the underlying pathophysiology. Similarly, the long-term effects of cardiac inflammation following a mild Covid infection need to be clarified in future studies, " the researcher added.
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