Neuropsychological Features of Severe Hospitalized Coronavirus Disease 2019 Patients at Clinical Stability and Clues for Postacute Rehabilitation.
Francesco Negrini, Irene Ferrario, Daniele Mazziotti and 5 others
PMID 32991870WHAT IT FOUND
In 9 severe hospitalized COVID-19 patients tested after clinical stability, 3 had general cognitive decline, 1 had frontal executive decline, and 6 had anxiety.
This small case series cannot show treatment effects.
Key findings
013 patients had pathologic MMSE scores, indicating general cognitive decline.
021 patient had a pathologic Frontal Assessment Battery score, with deficits in conceptualization, lexical fluency, and motor programming.
036 patients displayed anxiety symptoms, and 2 of them also had mild depressive symptoms.
STILL TO COME
How it was doneWhat they foundWhat it means for SLPs
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What it does not show
The sample was small, with 9 patients analyzed. There was no long-term follow-up. Testing occurred after about 1 month of hospitalization, so spontaneous recovery cannot be ruled out. The apparent association between cognitive decline and ICU length of stay was not tested statistically. All ICU patients were intubated, so intubation cannot be separated from ICU stay. Possible effects of isolation and proning were not controlled.
The easy way to misread this
Do not conclude that severe COVID-19 causes lasting cognitive decline or that therapy improves it. The study had only 9 patients, tested them after about 1 month, and had no control group or long-term follow-up.