The Battle Against Long COVID: Insights from New Research

Transcript Generated by AI.

Announcer: 0:00

Welcome to the MedEvidence Monday Minute Radio Show hosted by Kevin Geddings of WSOS St. Augustine Radio. Each Monday morning, Dr. Michael Koren calls in to bring you the latest medical updates with insightful discussions. Medevidence is where we help you navigate the real truth behind medical research, with both a clinical and research perspective. So sit back, relax and get ready to learn about the truth behind the data in medicine and healthcare. This is MedEvidence.

Kevin Geddings: 0:30

We love our time with Dr. Michael Koren Every Monday morning. He takes time out of his busy day and, of course, he's a medical doctor, research scientist and very engaged in our community here locally and heads up the show with ENCORE Research Group also is the driving force behind a great website that has good, trustworthy health care information MedEvidencecom MedEvidence.com. I wanted to talk briefly about long COVID, especially right now where a lot of us anecdotally are hearing about family members and friends who are getting COVID in the middle of this summer heat.

Dr. Michael Koren: 1:02

Yeah, well, one of the interesting things about living in Florida is that the seasonality of viruses is a little bit different. So usually around the country the worst part of the season is during the winter when people are indoors more, and Florida has some of that as well. But we also have this spike during the summer when people are indoors more because of the heat and the more people indoors seeking air conditioning and more comfortable environments. So this is not unusual for Floridians to have to deal with the summer spike of viruses.

Kevin Geddings: 1:34

Let's talk a little bit, too, about something that a lot of us have heard about. We don't know much about it as just regular laymen Long COVID what are your thoughts on that?

Dr. Michael Koren: 1:52

Yeah, it's a real problem. Even as a cardiologist, I see a lot of patients that have long COVID symptoms and really what that means is that a lot of people will get a virus and they'll shake it off after a few days and they pretty much get back to their normal routine relatively quickly. But in long COVID people have persistent symptoms that can last weeks or months or in some cases even a few years, and basically what that is is that the immune response to COVID causes people to have these long-term symptoms, such as a persistent cough, or have a fog that they can't quite get clear of, or they have an energy level that they can't quite deal with, or their balance is off or they get dizzy.

Dr. Michael Koren: 2:32

They have these sometimes vague symptoms that can literally last weeks or months and can be very disabling. So in the cardiology practice we see people that just can't get back to the gym.

Dr. Michael Koren: 2:44

They're still short of breath or they get up and they feel woozy. They feel like they're going to pass out A number of these symptoms that are now classified as long COVID and a very interesting paper just came out in the New England Journal of Medicine this past week Veterans Administration Database and thanks to the vets for being part of these type of research studies.

Dr. Michael Koren: 3:06

But ultimately, hundreds of thousands of veterans were evaluated, including hundreds of thousands of people who got COVID and the study looked to see what happened after their initial bout of COVID and whether or not they reported long COVID symptoms. So there was both really interesting and good news in the study and then some bad news in the study. So some of the good news was that the original virus that came from the Wuhan province was the type of virus that caused the most long COVID. In fact, up to 20% of vets who were infected with that Wuhan virus strain of the virus were developing long COVID type symptoms, and the good news is that vaccines reduce that incidence quite a bit. So if you're vaccinated, not only does that prevent you from getting COVID, but if you still happen to get it, the likelihood of having a long COVID syndrome is much lower.

Dr. Michael Koren: 4:02

Another little piece of good news is that the more recent variants, which are called the Omicron variants of COVID, are less likely to cause long COVID and vaccination still makes it less likely that you'll have long COVID. But even with vaccination, about 5% of people with an Omicron infection will still have some type of long COVID symptoms. Infection will still have some type of long COVID symptoms. So it's a reason to try to not only prepare yourself with a vaccine, but also to avoid the situations that could lead to infection. So, hand washing, mask wearing in the appropriate places, social distancing are still all things that should be part of your strategy.

Kevin Geddings: 4:39

Yeah, absolutely Well. And of course, you have an opportunity to participate not only in clinical research that deals with COVID and all these other issues, but the flu and some of the latest technologies in terms of delivering a flu vaccine, along with a whole host of other issues, and in the process, too, you're going to censor an assessment of maybe some other health challenges you may be facing that you may not even have all the information on yet right, you may not even have all the information on. Right?

Dr. Michael Koren: 5:03

Absolutely, and it's a really good point. So, in fact, as we speak, we're starting to get people signed up for the vaccine studies we're doing. By the way, it's not just COVID, we're also doing studies with influenza. We're doing studies with RSV. Remember, when you get a viral illness, you don't even know what one you have unless you test for it. So one of the nice advantages of our studies is that if you get involved with one of them, we will evaluate you if you do get sick and help you understand what virus you have.

Dr. Michael Koren: 5:34

So that's another little piece of the puzzle that we like to make sure people understand and one of the advantages of being part of the research. But my other point is that we're doing all types of programs. So, for example, if you don't like the messenger RNA vaccines for a reason, we're doing studies that don't involve messenger RNA. In fact, we're doing studies right now with a oral COVID vaccine that you take by mouth. So there's all kinds of programs ongoing that I think will allow people to find the right spot for them.

Dr. Michael Koren: 6:03

At my WJCT talk this past week I had a few people say, oh, I really wanted to do research but you were evaluated and we determined that you weren't a good candidate at the time, and they're obviously disappointed about that.

Dr. Michael Koren: 6:20

But that's not necessarily a bad thing, because when you come in and get your evaluation or you come in and speak with one of our people, we'll let you know what your priorities should be. So one example that I'll share with people is that a fellow came in. He wanted to be in a vaccine study but he knew that he needed surgery for kidney stones and we said appropriately that hey, that's your priority, you need to take care of that first, but he's in our database and when something comes up that fits his needs and criteria, we'll be more than happy to get him involved. So this concept that we're going to evaluate you in and give you some advice, based on whether or not you're a good candidate for a particular study, or the particular study that you may be interested in, and whether or not there's other compelling reasons that you need to think about other things first for your health, are all part of what we do.

Kevin Geddings: 7:08

Absolutely, and Dr Koren, talk to us really quick before we let you go about MedEvidence, why that's important?

Dr. Michael Koren: 7:14

MedEvidence is our educational platform where you get the truth behind the data, and it's a really important concept because, as you and I have talked about many times, MedEvidence we're just trying to get to the truth and we present all sides of the medical issue. We talk about what we know about the medical issue, what we don't know about the medical issue, and how we learn about the stuff that we don't know about. So it's a really neat way of getting really credible information and help people make good decisions based on what's done and what's not done and ultimately make decisions that will affect themselves and their family members in a very positive way.

Kevin Geddings: 7:51

Well, it is a great resource and much more trustworthy than Dr. Google, so we recommend that you do that. Dr. Koren, thank you very much for all your time on this Monday morning. Be safe out there driving around, okay, appreciate it.

Dr. Michael Koren: 8:04

Thanks, Kevin. Have a great week.

Announcer: 8:10

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