Neurological Research and Practice (Oct 2022)

No serological evidence for neuronal damage or reactive gliosis in neuro-COVID-19 patients with long-term persistent headache

  • Laura de Boni,
  • Alexandru Odainic,
  • Natalie Gancarczyk,
  • Luisa Kaluza,
  • Christian P. Strassburg,
  • Xenia A. K. Kersting,
  • Joseph M. Johnson,
  • Ullrich Wüllner,
  • Susanne V. Schmidt,
  • Jacob Nattermann,
  • Gabor C. Petzold

DOI
https://doi.org/10.1186/s42466-022-00217-5
Journal volume & issue
Vol. 4, no. 1
pp. 1 – 7

Abstract

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Abstract Recent studies have indicated that long-term neurological sequelae after COVID-19 are not accompanied by an increase of canonical biomarkers of central nervous system injury in blood, but subgroup stratifications are lacking. This is a particular concern in chronic headache, which can be a leading symptom of Post-COVID diseases associated with neuronal damage such as vasculitis or autoimmune encephalitis. We here compared patients with mild Post-COVID-19 syndrome and persistent headache (persistent Post-COVID-19 headache) lasting longer than 12 weeks after the initial serological diagnosis, to patients with mild and severe COVID-19 and COVID-19-negative controls. Levels of neurofilament light chain and glial fibrillary astrocytic protein, i.e. markers of neuronal damage and reactive astrogliosis, were lower in blood from patients with persistent Post-COVID-19 headache compared to patients with severe COVID-19. Hence, our pilot serological study indicates that long-term Post-COVID-19 headache may not be a sign of underlying neuronal damage or neuroinflammation.

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