Attention long COVID victims and their love ones

More evidence that damaged blood and clots are likely root cause of symptoms

MedPage Today did a story titled ‘Inflammation a Culprit in Long COVID Heart Problems — Prospective study illuminates mechanisms of lingering heart issues after mild COVID-19” because of a new study

In past articles I have focused on blood issues to explain long COVD symptoms. This new work is consistent with that view. Heart inflammation from COVID infection and vaccines is the core problem.

MedPage noted: “Federal survey data suggest that 19% of U.S. adults who had COVID have had symptoms that lasted 3 or more months after infection. In the current study, follow-up scans at a median of around 11 months after COVID-19 diagnosis showed ongoing cardiac symptoms in 57% of the participants. Those persistently symptomatic patients had more pronounced diffuse myocardial edema than those who recovered or never had symptoms (native T2 37.9 vs 37.4 and 37.5 ms, P=0.04).” These are significant data.

"Cardiac involvement is an important part of the long COVID presentation -- so the shortness in breath, the effort intolerance, tachycardia," said the author of the new research article.

From the research article:

Abstract

Cardiac symptoms are increasingly recognized as late complications of severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) infection in previously well individuals with mild initial illness, but the underlying pathophysiology leading to long-term cardiac symptoms remains unclear. In this study, we conducted serial cardiac assessments in a selected population of individuals with Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19) with no previous cardiac disease or notable comorbidities by measuring blood biomarkers of heart injury or dysfunction and by performing magnetic resonance imaging. Baseline measurements from 346 individuals with COVID-19 (52% females) were obtained at a median of 109 days (interquartile range (IQR), 77–177 days) after infection, when 73% of participants reported cardiac symptoms, such as exertional dyspnea (62%), palpitations (28%), atypical chest pain (27%) and syncope (3%). Symptomatic individuals had higher heart rates and higher imaging values or contrast agent accumulation, denoting inflammatory cardiac involvement, compared to asymptomatic individuals. Structural heart disease or high levels of biomarkers of cardiac injury or dysfunction were rare in symptomatic individuals. At follow-up (329 days (IQR, 274–383 days) after infection), 57% of participants had persistent cardiac symptoms. Diffuse myocardial edema was more pronounced in participants who remained symptomatic at follow-up as compared to those who improved. Female gender and diffuse myocardial involvement on baseline imaging independently predicted the presence of cardiac symptoms at follow-up. Ongoing inflammatory cardiac involvement may, at least in part, explain the lingering cardiac symptoms in previously well individuals with mild initial COVID-19 illness.

Note that all the research on long COVID never finds out how many people besides having had COVID infection also had vaccine shots.