{"id":1343,"date":"2021-08-03T20:21:16","date_gmt":"2021-08-03T20:21:16","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/wp.cov19longhaulfoundation.org\/?p=1343"},"modified":"2021-08-03T20:21:16","modified_gmt":"2021-08-03T20:21:16","slug":"eye-scan-could-determine-whether-covid-patients-will-be-long-haulers","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/cov19longhaulfoundation.org\/?p=1343","title":{"rendered":"Eye scan could determine whether COVID patients will be \u2018long haulers\u2019"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Authors: <a href=\"https:\/\/www.studyfinds.org\/author\/stephen\/\">by Study Finds<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\" style=\"font-size:24px\">Long COVID\u201d continues to confound doctors as patients still struggle with debilitating symptoms months after first being infection. A new study now suggests that COVID patients who could be long-haulers could be diagnosed by taking a close look at their eyes. Nerve fiber loss and an increase in key immune cells on the surface of the eye may be a way of identifying the long term impact of the virus, say scientists.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\" style=\"font-size:24px\">The changes are particularly evident among those with neurological symptoms, such as&nbsp;<a href=\"https:\/\/www.studyfinds.org\/covid-lose-of-taste-smell-5-months\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">loss of taste and smell,<\/a>&nbsp;headache, dizziness, numbness, and neuropathic pain. Doctors at Weill Cornell Medicine-Qatar say long COVID is&nbsp;<a href=\"https:\/\/www.studyfinds.org\/200-covid-long-hauler-symptoms-identified\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">characterized by a range of symptoms<\/a>&nbsp;which continue for more than four weeks after the acute phase of the infection has passed, and which aren\u2019t explained by an alternative diagnosis.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\" style=\"font-size:24px\">Around one in 10 people infected by the virus will become COVID long-haulers. It has been suggested that small nerve fiber damage may underlie&nbsp;<a href=\"https:\/\/www.studyfinds.org\/covid-19-changes-blood-cells\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">its development<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\" style=\"font-size:24px\">To explore the theory, researchers used a real-time, non-invasive, high-resolution imaging laser technique, called&nbsp;<em>corneal confocal microscopy<\/em>&nbsp;\u2014 or CCM \u2014 to pick up nerve damage in the cornea. The cornea is the transparent part of the eye that covers the pupil, iris, and the fluid-filled interior. Its main function is to focus most of the&nbsp;<a href=\"https:\/\/www.studyfinds.org\/ultra-thin-sensors-smart-contacts\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">light entering the eye<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\" style=\"font-size:24px\">CCM has been used to identify nerve damage and inflammatory changes attributable to diabetic neuropathy,\u00a0<a rel=\"noreferrer noopener\" href=\"https:\/\/studyfinds.org\/tag\/multiple-sclerosis\" target=\"_blank\">multiple sclerosis<\/a>, and fibromyalgia..<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-large-font-size wp-block-paragraph\">For More Information: <a href=\"https:\/\/www.studyfinds.org\/eye-scan-determines-long-covid\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">https:\/\/www.studyfinds.org\/eye-scan-determines-long-covid\/<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Authors: by Study Finds Long COVID\u201d continues to confound doctors as patients still struggle with debilitating symptoms months after first being infection. A new study now suggests that COVID patients [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":1344,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[765,161,252,561,567,634],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1343","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-cornea","category-eyesight","category-inflammation","category-symptoms-covid-19","category-taste-smell","category-vision"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/cov19longhaulfoundation.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1343","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/cov19longhaulfoundation.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/cov19longhaulfoundation.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cov19longhaulfoundation.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cov19longhaulfoundation.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1343"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/cov19longhaulfoundation.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1343\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cov19longhaulfoundation.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/1344"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/cov19longhaulfoundation.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1343"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cov19longhaulfoundation.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1343"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cov19longhaulfoundation.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1343"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}