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ScienceMRI study spotlights impact of long COVID on the brain (cidrap.umn.edu)

submitted by spiky-proteinBoosted! ✨💉✅

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[–]flowing42 96 points97 points  (7 children)

Certainly not reassuring that patients who had COVID-19 previously both with and without long COVID symptoms all showed signs of microstructural alterations.

Edit: fixed my wording to match the article.

[–]ReneeismeBoosted! ✨💉✅ 25 points26 points  (2 children)

That's what jumped out at me. It might be that everyone shows changes, but there's a difference in degree, or a difference in the areas of the brains impacted, with some areas not producing symptoms as noticeable as others.

It's a pretty small sample size and thus not really a solid base to speculate from, but we are rapidly losing the ability to scan the brains of uninfected persons, and this might be the best we get.

[–]strangeelement 13 points14 points  (1 child)

It's a pretty small sample size and thus not really a solid base to speculate from, but we are rapidly losing the ability to scan the brains of uninfected persons, and this might be the best we get.

At this point I think we pretty much lost it. Because of asymptomatic infections, it's basically impossible to be sure about any controls. The strategy of encouraging mass infections is especially disastrous given how almost all medical evidence requires controls.

The only reliable method would be before-and-after using pre-COVID scans. And those are more likely to have problems.

This all feels a bit too close to the lead problem, except entirely self-inflicted.

[–]ReneeismeBoosted! ✨💉✅ 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Right. The pre-covid scans generally exist because the person was experiencing problems, and post covid there’s no reliable way to say the person hasn’t been infected some time over these four years. I agree that the policy of not trying to mitigate covid at all is crippling the science, but I doubt that was intentional. There were so many more obvious political and social benefits to just pretending it didn’t matter anymore.

[–]mollyforeverBoosted! ✨💉✅ -1 points0 points  (3 children)

Source? That's not what the article says.

[–]Meghanshadow 19 points20 points  (0 children)

Interestingly, the DMI revealed microstructure changes in patients with long COVID and in those who were infected with COVID-19 but did not develop lingering symptoms.

[–]flowing42 7 points8 points  (0 children)

Thank you for pointing out my wording was incorrect. I fixed it to match the article. Being someone that has had COVID, perhaps I am feeling the effects.

[–]spiky-proteinBoosted! ✨💉✅[S] 38 points39 points  (0 children)

Article from the University of Minnesota's Center for Infectious Disease Research and Policy:

​

A new study comparing magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) images of patients with long COVID, fully recovered COVID-19 survivors, and healthy controls shows microstructural changes in different brain regions in the long-COVID patients. The findings will be presented next week at the annual meeting of the Radiological Society of North America.

The research is the first to use diffusion microstructure imaging (DMI), a novel MRI technique, which looks at the movement of water molecules in tissues. DFI can detect smaller brain changes than traditional MRI.

MRIs have thus far failed to compare microstructural differences in the brain of patients with long COVID, frustrating clinicians searching for a pathophysiologic explanation of the disorder, which affects up to 10% to 15% of COVID-19 patients.

"Diffusion microstructure imaging (DMI) is a promising approach to fill this gap, as it detects even small volume shifts between microstructural compartments of a neural tissue model," the authors of the study said.

The study included images from 89 patients with long COVID, 38 COVID-19 patients who didn't report long-term symptoms, and 46 healthy controls with no history of COVID-19 infection.

Among participants with long COVID, 53% of patients could not return to their previous level of independence and/or employment due to infection. Cognitive performance was impaired in 41%, 78% said they had fatigue, and 73% had impaired olfaction.

Brain structure changes among all COVID participants

In an abstract on the findings, the authors explain whole-brain DMI-data revealed a volume-shift from the extraneurite compartment into the free water fraction for the gray matter positively associated with the severity of the initial COVID-19 infection.

"This study allows for an in vivo insight on the impact of COVID-19 on the brain," said lead study author Alexander Rau, MD, of the University Hospital Freiburg in Germany, in a press release. "Expression of post-COVID symptoms was associated with specific affected cerebral networks, suggesting a pathophysiological basis of this syndrome."

Interestingly, the DMI revealed microstructure changes in patients with long COVID and in those who were infected with COVID-19 but did not develop lingering symptoms.

"We noted gray matter alterations in both patients with long-COVID and those unimpaired after a COVID-19 infection," said Rau. "Interestingly, we not only noted widespread microstructural alterations in patients with long COVID, but also in those unimpaired after having contracted COVID-19." [Emphasis mine]

The authors of the study said that though the findings are intriguing, they do little to explain why some patients develop long COVID and others do not.

[–]streetvoyager 35 points36 points  (2 children)

So basically everyone that has had a Covid infection whether they have long covid symptoms or not likely has structural changes in the brain . That’s fucked up. The effects this is going to have on society 10-20 years down the road is going to be disasterous.

Who knows what kind of crazy shit this is going to cause. More of a reason to keep up on vaccines and avoid getting repeat infections . I wonder if they are based on infections from earlier strains or more current ones.

[–]EgonEggnog 9 points10 points  (0 children)

One important, and not being a dick, question we should ask is that if other viral illnesses produce similar results. If you take an MRI of my brain before and after mono, or the flu, or RSV, will there be changes to my brain as well?

[–]PresentPhilosopher99 5 points6 points  (0 children)

what scare me is years ago there was a study where covid infections produce Lewy bodies on animals.

i find it i think.

​

https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1101/2021.02.23.432474v1

[–]altcastle 17 points18 points  (5 children)

I have a brain MRI this week, reading this to hopefully see if they’ll be able to tell. The alternatives are more scary so here’s hoping it’s “just” LC. I previously didn’t think they’d be able to see anything (and my doctor didn’t think so either, he’s really current on info so will no doubt see this).

Edit: on reading it takes a special kind of MRI, doubt that’s what I’m getting. But I will ask.

[–]Unknown__Content 12 points13 points  (1 child)

My brain MRI is this Saturday. Ruling other scary things out, but doc suspects LC. Good luck w yours.

[–]altcastle 7 points8 points  (0 children)

Same to you!

[–]atihigf 2 points3 points  (2 children)

Good luck! I had a brain MRI this week as well for other reasons. Did your doc order IV contrast?

[–]altcastle 2 points3 points  (1 child)

I guess I don’t know. I just scheduled the MRI, they didn’t really ask me questions or fill me in. Though since they didn’t mention not eating or drinking, I take that means no.

[–]zyklon_snuggles 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Though since they didn’t mention not eating or drinking, I take that means no.

Just FYI, this is not indicative either way for MRI contrast or not.