Post-COVID Risk for Blood Clot Lasts at Least 6 Months

By Robert Preidt HealthDay Reporter
HealthDay Reporter

THURSDAY, April 7, 2022 (HealthDay News) — COVID-19 will increase individuals’s danger of harmful blood clots and bleeding for months after an infection, researchers say.

The new findings recommend that COVID-19 is an impartial danger issue for deep vein thrombosis, pulmonary embolism and bleeding.

“Our findings arguably help [treatment] to keep away from thrombotic occasions, particularly for high-risk sufferers, and strengthen the significance of vaccination towards COVID-19,” the examine authors concluded within the report revealed April 6 within the BMJ.

While the added danger of clots and bleeding was identified, it was unclear how lengthy it lasted, the researchers famous in a journal information launch.

To discover out, the investigators in contrast a couple of million individuals in Sweden who examined constructive for COVID-19 between Feb. 1, 2020, and May 25, 2021, and a management group of greater than 4 million individuals who didn’t have a constructive COVID take a look at.

Compared to the management group, COVID-19 sufferers had a considerably increased danger of deep vein thrombosis, or DVT, (a blood clot within the leg) for as much as three months after an infection; pulmonary embolism (a blood clot within the lung) for as much as six months; and a bleeding occasion for as much as two months.

After accounting for quite a few probably vital components, the researchers concluded that these with COVID-19 had a 5 occasions’ increased danger of DVT; a 33-fold increased danger of pulmonary embolism; and an almost doubled danger of bleeding within the 30 days after an infection.

Deep vein thrombosis occurred in 0.04% of COVID-19 sufferers and 0.01% of management sufferers. Pulmonary embolism occurred in 0.17% of COVID-19 sufferers and 0.004% of management sufferers. And bleeding occasions occurred in 0.10% of COVID-19 sufferers and 0.04% of management sufferers, in line with the report.

The dangers of blood clots and bleeding had been highest in sufferers whose COVID-19 was extra extreme, these with different well being circumstances and people contaminated in the course of the first wave slightly than within the second and third waves. The researchers mentioned that could possibly be defined by improved remedy and vaccine protection in older sufferers after the primary wave.

Even sufferers with delicate COVID-19 had an elevated danger of DVT and pulmonary embolism, the examine discovered. While no elevated danger of bleeding was present in these with delicate COVID, there was a noticeable enhance in sufferers with extra extreme an infection.

The examine was led by Anne-Marie Fors Connolly of the division of medical microbiology at Umeå University in Sweden.

Frederick Ho of the Institute of Health and Wellbeing on the University of Glasgow in Scotland and his colleagues wrote an editorial that accompanied the findings.

Even although many nations are eradicating pandemic restrictions and shifting their focus to dwelling with COVID-19, this examine “reminds us of the necessity to stay vigilant to the problems related to even delicate SARS-CoV-2 an infection, together with thromboembolism,” Ho’s workforce wrote.

More data

There’s extra on COVID-19 and the blood on the U.S. National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute.

SOURCE: BMJ, information launch, April 6, 2022