An infection that affects the lungs and airways is what Covid-19 has on alert to the world. Typical symptoms include coughing, shortness of breath and fever, which can range from mild symptoms to triggering severe pneumonia and eventually death.
When the coronavirus attacks the lungs, it causes inflammation in the mucous membranes, damaging the pulmonary alveoli, which involves a greater effort to supply oxygen to the blood and remove carbon dioxide by exhalation.
This inflammation and the damage it causes in the flow of oxygen can cause the lungs to fill with fluid, pus and dead cells.
In Kwai Chung, Hong Kong, studies on patients who have recovered from Covid-19 showed that the disease reduced lung capacity by up to 30%, the South China Morning Post reported.
Some patients who recovered from Covid-19 have suffered from reduced lung function and are now experiencing problems such as shortness of breath while walking quickly, the Hong Kong Hospital Authority revealed its findings after observing the first group of patients with discharged coronavirus.
Owen Tsang Tak-yin, medical director of the Center for Infectious Diseases at Princess Margaret Hospital in Kwai Chung, said doctors had already seen a dozen patients discharged for follow-up. Two or three couldn’t do things the way they had done in the past.
“They jadean if they walk a little faster, ” said Tsang. “Some patients may have about a 20 to 30% drop in lung function [después de la recuperación]”.
Tsang, who also leads a working group on clinical management of the infection, said these patients would undergo tests to determine how much lung function they still had. Physical therapy would also be organized to strengthen your lungs.
In addition, a review of the lung scans of nine infected patients at Princess Margaret found frosted glass-like patterns in all of them, suggesting organ damage.
That is if the specialist was emphatically to clarify that the long-term effect on recovered patients, as if they would develop pulmonary fibrosis — a condition in which the lung tissue hardens and the organ is not functioning properly – had not yet been determined.
