US researchers say they have discovered a subtype of long COVID characterized by persistent inflammation, a finding that could help identify dominant disease pathways of diagnostic or therapeutic value.
For the ongoing study, published late last week in Nature Communications, researchers at Fred Hutchinson Cancer Center and the Allen Institute for Immunology in Seattle assessed serum proteome (proteins) in blood samples obtained from 55 patients who reported COVID-19 symptoms lasting at least 60 days after infection in 2020. The team compared the samples with those of 24 recovered patients and 22 uninfected participants.
The study authors noted that long COVID may be caused by persistent inflammation, unresolved tissue damage, or detailed clearance of viral protein or RNA but that the biologic differences these factors represent are not well understood.
From University of Minnesota
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