Cognitive Impairment in People Recovering from COVID-19

Publication date: July 22, 2021 DOI: https : //doi.org/10.1016/j.eclinm.2021.101044

Explanation

Because of concerns about the impact of COVID-19 on cognitive function, this study was designed to investigate information about the nature and broader prevalence of cognitive problems after infection and across the full spectrum of disease severity.

Cross-sectional cognitive performance data from 81,337 participants who underwent a clinically validated web-optimized assessment as part of the Great British Intelligence Test between January and December 2020 and suspected and confirmed COVID-19 infection and respiratory symptoms.

Findings showed that those who recovered COVID-19 symptoms had significant cognitive deficits compared to controls in controlling for age, gender, education level, income, racial ethnic group, preexisting medical disability, malaise, depression, and anxiety.

They found that these deficits were not only in hospitalized patients (N = 192), but also in non-hospitalized cases with biological confirmation of COVID-19 infection (N = 326), with a substantial effect size.

Analysis of markers of intelligence prior to illness did not support these differences present prior to infection, and a more detailed analysis of performance across subtests supported the hypothesis that COVID-19 has a multi-domain impact on human cognition.

These results are consistent with reports of "long-covid" cognitive symptoms that persist into the early chronic phase, and therefore require longitudinal, neuroimaging cohort studies to plot recovery trajectories and identify the biological basis of cognitive impairment in SARS-COV-2 survivors.