Coronavirus: WHO shares three most prevalent post-COVID symptoms

There are three post-COVID symptoms which are prevalent says Dr Janet Diaz, Lead, Clinical Management WHE at the World Health Organisation (WHO).

Third year into the pandemic, not just our fight against the invisible microbe enemy continues, we have a more daunting challenge ahead of us: dealing with post-COVID conditions otherwise known as long-COVID conditions.

People have been facing a number of complications even after recovering from the infection. Issue of long COVID came to the fore a few months back after we survived the pandemic for more than a year. With the growing number of cases related to long COVID, it is evident that COVID doesn't spare any body organ and leaves its footprints in the biological ecosystem which shows up even months and years later.

Long COVID usually lasts for two months. "But if it goes away after a week or a couple of weeks or a month, then we don't consider it to be long COVID," says the expert.

"There are three common symptoms of post-COVID condition: one is fatigue, second is shortness of breath or trouble breathing and the third is cognitive dysfunction," says Dr Diaz.

But this is just three, there are actually over 200 symptoms described in the literature from patients who have had or have post-COVID-19 condition, she adds.

Post COVID many people have experienced fatigue. Fatigue is a normal response of the body when fighting against a viral infection. This condition persists in an individual for weeks. Experts have said that fatigue is a fairly common symptom found in all patients who recover from COVID.

"Are you more limited? Let's say you used to run one mile, is it now that you don't feel you're able to run as long because you're feeling shortness of breath?," says Dr Diaz and adds that so we have to look at what your functional status was before and how you elicit if you're feeling trouble breathing.

Shortness of breath or gasping for air with minimal physical activity is a common occurrence in people who have been infected with COVID.

COVID affects the normal functioning of the brain. "That is a fancy term of what is commonly referred to as brain fog. And what does that mean? That means people are having trouble with their attention, having trouble with concentration, having trouble with recall or memory, trouble sleeping, trouble with executive functioning," says Dr Diaz.

COVID impairs cognitive functioning in many people.

The expert also talks about one of the most important and serious impacts of COVID which is related to heart health.

"Cardiovascular symptoms can present in different ways. They can present as shortness of breath, I've already described the shortness of breath, they can present as heart palpitations. Your heart is racing or what we call arrhythmias and other cardiac symptoms can present as myocardial infarctions," says the WHO expert.

"Now, there has been a recent report that was looking at patients who had COVID-19, and it followed them up a year after. And this report was coming out of a cohort in the United States, and they found increased risk of cardiovascular complications in that cohort and those complications are described as having had stroke, acute myocardial infarction, which means heart attack or other causes of thrombosis or blood clots and including death. So they did report increased risk of death in that one year after the acute COVID-19," she adds, emphasizing on how post COVID heart health should not be overlooked.

Read: COVID leads to unexplainable symptoms, say experts

"In our case definition, we say people should start worrying about three months after their acute COVID-19 illness. That gives some people time to recover from the acute infection, even if they've had mild disease or more severe disease. After three months, that's when we say, if you have one of these symptoms, then be concerned that you could have post-COVID-19 condition and get evaluated," says Dr Diaz.

For long COVID, the treatment is not one treatment for all patients. "The treatment has to be patient- centered and focused on the symptoms the patient is presenting with. Now we don't have any drugs for the treatment of post-COVID-19 conditions, but we do have interventions such as rehab interventions or self management techniques in order to help people improve their quality of life while they still have these symptoms that have not yet fully recovered," she says.

On handling post COVID conditions she suggests not to overindulge in activities that trigger the condition.

"Do not overexert yourself if you have fatigue, do not multitask if you have brain fog," she says and recommends taking timely inputs from physicians on this condition.

Read: Doctors explain how a high-salt and a high-protein diet harm your kidneys