ASSESSMENT OF QUALITY OF LIFE, ANXIETY, VEGETATIVE AND COGNITIVE SPHERE IN AFTER-COVID PATIENTS

Abstract

Introduction. The lack of clear recommendations on treating diverse neurological manifestations of COVID syndrome urges the development of methods for objectiva-tion and assessment of the severity and treatment of such clinical manifestations.
The study aimed to assess the level of vegetative, anxiety, and cognitive disorders in post-COVID patients and their development against metabolic therapy.
Material and methods. The study involved 60 participants, including 40 in the main group, and 20 controls. The main group received Mildronate® 500 mg BID for 45 days, the controls received no meta-
bolic therapy. All participants received treatment under clinical protocols according to their established diagnosis.
Results. Patients in both groups mainly complained of asthenia and fatigue. Metabolic therapy decreased the subjective complaints for asthenia and fatigue by twofold, from 88±5.2% to 45±7.8% for asthenia and 85±5.6% to 35±7.5% fot fatigue. The cog-nitive function was below the accepted threshold by the MoCA scale (≤26 points) evi-dencing the reduced function in both groups. According to the MoCA test, metabolic therapy improved the cognitive function up to the threshold level (26.8±2.7). Even the elderly group with the lowest aggregate result showed a very positive growth by 1.4 points (24.1±3.1 to 25.5±2.7).
The vegetative dystonia syndrome has nearly vanished in the main group, in-cluding the group with the most pronounced deviations (33±17.3 to 25.9±16.2). How-ever, the controls showed a slightly negative dynamics and an increase in prevalence of this syndrome (28.2±12.6 to 28.4±10.6). The vegetative reflexes in the main group demonstrated the normalisation of vegetative reactivity versus no improvement and even a more pronounced paradoxical reaction in the controls.
The quality of life has notably improved in the main group (by 2 points) vs. a decrease by 1 point in the controls. The anxiety symptoms disappeared in the main group, including the group of young patients 18 to 40 years, who demonstrated the highest anxiety (7.8±4.4 to 4.5±3.5).
Discussion. The conducted study indicated that post-COVID patients need a compex rehabilitation including symptomatic treatment and metabolic correction of energy deficiency due to toxic cell damage and endothelial dysfunction. A prevailing brain hypoxia requires a drug that can stabilize microcirculation and compensate for energy deficiency of cells under conditions of ischemia. In our study, the use of
Mildronate® reduced the asthenia and fatigue by twofold while increasing the working capacity of patients of the main group, removing the vegetative dystonia syndrome, normalizing the cognitive function, significantly reducing anxiety, and improving the quality of life.
Conclusions. Mildronate® has a high therapeutic potential and can be recommended for metabolic therapy of asthenic, vegetative, anxiety and cognitive disorders in order to improve the quality of life of patients with post-COVID syndrome.