80% Of COVID-19 Recovered Patients Experience Heart Damage

By Nsunjo Erica

A new study published in the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA) Cardiology has found out that nearly 80 percent of COVID recovered patients are experiencing heart damage.

The research, which was conducted out of Germany’s University Hospital Frankfurt, examined the MRI scans of 100 patients diagnosed with COVID-19, most of whom were otherwise healthy and in their 40s and 50s. The scans showed that 78 of the patients had signs of heart damage.

The study’s lead author, Valentina Putmann, MD, cardiologist, and clinical pharmacologist said that even if COVID-19 illness does not scream out with the classical heart symptoms, such as anginal chest pain, recovered patients experience heart damage.

Furthermore, 60 percent of the patients showed signs of inflammation. The researchers say these startling findings demonstrate the need for “ongoing investigation of the long-term cardiovascular consequences of COVID-19.”

Scientists revealed yet another specific venue through which coronavirus can attack your heart, researchers are seeing an increase in patients battling broken heart syndrome, and they believe that it is being indirectly brought on by coronavirus.

For this study, researchers compared five cohorts of patients across two hospitals who were hospitalized over a period before the pandemic and one after. In those earlier eight-week periods, there were between five and 12 cases of broken heart syndrome recorded. But the fifth period, amid coronavirus, saw 20 patients deal with the condition.

Scientists have noted that broken heart syndrome is not a symptom of COVID-19 itself, the highlighted that does appear to be a new health hazard which the pandemic has caused because of other stressors that the pandemic has caused.

Scientists are raising a new and very evident concern that cardiomyopathy and heart failure related to COVID-19 may potentially evolve as the natural history of this infection becomes clearer.

Experts are continuing to study COVID-19 and its long-lasting effects, for more information on how COVID-19 affects the heart, check out Most Coronavirus Patients Have Serious Damage to This Vital Organ.