Seniors at Higher Risk of Other Medical Conditions After COVID-19 Adam Leitenberger - Medscape
go to original February 12, 2022

Nearly one-third of adults over age 65 developed one or more new medical conditions in the weeks following a COVID-19 infection, according to new research.

The findings of the observational study, which were published in the BMJ, show the risk of a new condition being triggered by COVID is more than twice as high in seniors, compared with younger patients. Plus, the researchers observed an even higher risk among those who were hospitalized, with nearly half (46%) of patients having developed new conditions after the acute COVID-19 infection period.

Respiratory failure with shortness of breath was the most common postacute sequela, but a wide range of heart, kidney, lung, liver, cognitive, mental health, and other conditions were diagnosed at least 3 weeks after initial infection and persisted beyond 30 days.

This is one of the first studies to specifically describe the incidence and severity of new conditions triggered by COVID-19 infection in a general sample of older adults, said study author Ken Cohen MD, FACP, executive director of translational research at Optum Labs and national senior medical director at Optum Care.

"Much of what has been published on the postacute sequelae of COVID-19 has been predominantly from a younger population, and many of the patients had been hospitalized," Cohen noted. "This was the first study to focus on a large population of seniors, most of whom did not require hospitalization."

Cohen and colleagues reviewed the health insurance records of more than 133,000 Medicare beneficiaries aged 65 or older who were diagnosed with COVID-19 before April 2020. They also matched individuals by age, race, sex, hospitalization status, and other factors to comparison groups without COVID-19 (one from 2020 and one from 2019), and to a group diagnosed with other lower respiratory tract viral infections before the pandemic.

Risk of Developing New Conditions Was Higher in Hospitalized Patients

After acute COVID-19 infection, 32% of seniors sought medical care for at least one new medical condition in 2020, compared with 21% of uninfected people in the same year.

The most commonly observed conditions included:

  •  Respiratory failure (7.55% higher risk)
  •  Fatigue (5.66% higher risk).
  •  High blood pressure (4.43% higher risk)
  •  Memory problems (2.63% higher risk)
  •  Kidney injury (2.59% higher risk)
  •  Mental health diagnoses (2.5% higher risk)
  •  Blood-clotting disorders (1.47 % higher risk)
  •  Heart rhythm disorders (2.9% higher risk)

Read the rest at Medscape

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