Abstract
Objective: The aim was to conduct a review on the literature on objective cognitive impairment in patients after COVID-19.Methods: We performed a literature review and searched Ovid Medline in February 2021 based on a PECO scheme.Results: Twelve articles met all inclusion criteria. Total patient sample was <1,000. All studies on global cognitive function found impairment, ranging from 15 to 80% of the sampled patients. Seven studies on attention and executive functions reported impairment, with varying results depending on sub-domain and different tests. Three out of four studies reported memory difficulties, with two studies reporting short-term memory deficits. Although results indicate possible language impairment, only one study used domain-specific language tasks. Two out of four studies on visuospatial function did not report any impairment.Conclusion: Patients with recent SARS-CoV-2 infection appear to experience global cognitive impairment, impairment in memory, attention and executive function, and in particular verbal fluency. Based on the current results, we recommend clinicians to evaluate the need for cognitive assessment of patients with a recent COVID-19 infection, regardless of the severity of the disease, treatment methods and length of ICU stay. We need studies with larger sample and control group.
Highlights
Severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) causes the coronavirus disease 19 (COVID-19)
We identified and removed 47 duplicates and 32 articles in a language other than English
Based on the reported evidence it seems that patients in various degrees, suffer from short-term cognitive impairment following COVID-19 infection
Summary
Severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) causes the coronavirus disease 19 (COVID-19). It first appeared in Wuhan, Hubei, China (1), and spread to the rest of the world, making it a pandemic. Over the past 10 years, there have been two other coronavirus epidemics that caused severe infections: the severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS-CoV) epidemic in 2003 (2) and the Middle East respiratory syndrome (MERS-CoV) (3). COVID-19 was reported to be primarily a lower respiratory tract disease, and common symptoms included fever, cough, and shortness of breath (1). The severity varies, ranging from asymptomatic or very mild symptoms, such as a cold or pneumonia, to very severe symptoms and acute respiratory failure insufficiency (4)
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