RESEARCHERS have uncovered a trajectory of significant kidney impairment in people with long Covid 30 days after infection.
Adverse kidney outcomes increased in line with the severity of people’s acute SARS-CoV-2 infections.
The public health costs and quality-of-life implications for people with long Covid and chronic kidney disease are significant.
Scientists working at the Veterans Administration (VA) St. Louis Health Care System and the Washington University School of Medicine, also in St. Louis, have revealed jarring results regarding kidney impairment in some people with long Covid, or post-acute sequelae of Covid-19 syndrome (PASC)Trusted Source.
These physician-researchers and epidemiologists uncovered alarming data regarding the effects of SARS-CoV-2 on people with varying degrees of illness severity.
The study findings appear in the Journal of the American Society of Nephrology. Stay informed with live updates on the current Covid-19 outbreak and visit our coronavirus hub for more advice on prevention and treatment.
Leveraging the broad reach of the VA Health Care System to follow and clinically study people, this investigation augmented previous outcomes from the largest study to dateTrusted Source of people experiencing PASC symptoms. That research is by the same authors.
In an interview for Medical News Today, Dr. Al-Aly noted that he and his colleagues embarked on this research inspired by their patients’ complaints of persistent, debilitating symptoms post-acute Covid-19.
“That launched us into Covid-19 research to start with, that feedback from the patient community. [W]e knew at this point that we need to look at this — we need to look at the broad picture of long Covid.”
He further observed: “The main message was [that] long Covid could affect every organ system. And we knew it could affect the kidney. [W]e wanted to do a deep dive into the long-term consequences of Covid-19 on kidney function and kidney disease. That is the story that led us here.”
The researchers stratified and compared patients in two arms: individuals who had a SARS-CoV-2 infection and those who did not.
