Cargando…

Long COVID in Young Patients: Impact on Lung Volume Evaluated Using Multidetector CT

Purpose: To evaluate using quantitative analysis on chest CT images a possible lung volume reduction in Long COVID patients who complain mild respiratory symptoms, with chest CT negative for inflammatory findings. Materials and Methods: CT images of patients from 18 to 40 years old who underwent che...

Descripción completa

Detalles Bibliográficos
Autores principales: Bellini, Davide, Capodiferro, Paola, Vicini, Simone, Rengo, Marco, Carbone, Iacopo
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: MDPI 2023
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC10366757/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/37489469
http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/tomography9040101
_version_ 1785077238331342848
author Bellini, Davide
Capodiferro, Paola
Vicini, Simone
Rengo, Marco
Carbone, Iacopo
author_facet Bellini, Davide
Capodiferro, Paola
Vicini, Simone
Rengo, Marco
Carbone, Iacopo
author_sort Bellini, Davide
collection PubMed
description Purpose: To evaluate using quantitative analysis on chest CT images a possible lung volume reduction in Long COVID patients who complain mild respiratory symptoms, with chest CT negative for inflammatory findings. Materials and Methods: CT images of patients from 18 to 40 years old who underwent chest CT scan at our institution were analyzed retrospectively, using AwServer Thoracic VCAR software for a quantitative study. Exclusion criteria were inflammatory findings at CT, previous lung surgery, lung cancer, and breath artifacts that invalidate the quality of images. Patients were divided into two groups: in the first one (“post-COVID”) were patients who had previous SARS-CoV-2 infection, confirmed by an RT-PCR, who underwent chest CT from 3 to 6 months after their negativization for long COVID symptoms; in the control group (“non-COVID”), were enrolled patients who underwent a chest CT scan from January 2018 to December 2019, before the spread of COVID in Italy. Results: Our final population included 154 TC, 77 post-COVID patients (mean age 33 ± 6) and 77 non-COVID patients (mean age 33 ± 4.9). Non statistical significative differences were obtained between groups in terms of age, sex, and other characteristics that affect total lung capacity such as obesity, thoracic malformations, and smoking habit. Mean values of the total lung volume (TV), right-lung volume (RV), and left-lung volume (LV) in the post-COVID group compared with non-COVID group were, respectively: 5.25 ± 0.25 L vs. 5.72 ± 0.26 L (p = 0.01); 2.76 ± 0.14 L vs. 3 ± 0.14 L (p = 0.01); 2.48 ± 0.12 L vs. 2.72 ± 0.12 L (p = 0.01). Conclusion: In patients with symptoms suggesting Long COVID and negative chest CT macroscopic findings, quantitative volume analysis demonstrated a mean value of reduction in lung volume of 10% compared to patients of the same age who never had COVID. A chest CT negative for inflammatory findings may induce clinicians to attribute Long COVID mild respiratory symptoms to anxiety, especially in young patients. Our study brings us beyond appearances and beyond the classic radiological signs, introducing a quantitative evaluation of lung volumes in these patients. It is hard to establish to what extent this finding may contribute to Long COVID symptoms, but this is another step to gain a wider knowledge of the potential long-term effects caused by this new virus.
format Online
Article
Text
id pubmed-10366757
institution National Center for Biotechnology Information
language English
publishDate 2023
publisher MDPI
record_format MEDLINE/PubMed
spelling pubmed-103667572023-07-26 Long COVID in Young Patients: Impact on Lung Volume Evaluated Using Multidetector CT Bellini, Davide Capodiferro, Paola Vicini, Simone Rengo, Marco Carbone, Iacopo Tomography Article Purpose: To evaluate using quantitative analysis on chest CT images a possible lung volume reduction in Long COVID patients who complain mild respiratory symptoms, with chest CT negative for inflammatory findings. Materials and Methods: CT images of patients from 18 to 40 years old who underwent chest CT scan at our institution were analyzed retrospectively, using AwServer Thoracic VCAR software for a quantitative study. Exclusion criteria were inflammatory findings at CT, previous lung surgery, lung cancer, and breath artifacts that invalidate the quality of images. Patients were divided into two groups: in the first one (“post-COVID”) were patients who had previous SARS-CoV-2 infection, confirmed by an RT-PCR, who underwent chest CT from 3 to 6 months after their negativization for long COVID symptoms; in the control group (“non-COVID”), were enrolled patients who underwent a chest CT scan from January 2018 to December 2019, before the spread of COVID in Italy. Results: Our final population included 154 TC, 77 post-COVID patients (mean age 33 ± 6) and 77 non-COVID patients (mean age 33 ± 4.9). Non statistical significative differences were obtained between groups in terms of age, sex, and other characteristics that affect total lung capacity such as obesity, thoracic malformations, and smoking habit. Mean values of the total lung volume (TV), right-lung volume (RV), and left-lung volume (LV) in the post-COVID group compared with non-COVID group were, respectively: 5.25 ± 0.25 L vs. 5.72 ± 0.26 L (p = 0.01); 2.76 ± 0.14 L vs. 3 ± 0.14 L (p = 0.01); 2.48 ± 0.12 L vs. 2.72 ± 0.12 L (p = 0.01). Conclusion: In patients with symptoms suggesting Long COVID and negative chest CT macroscopic findings, quantitative volume analysis demonstrated a mean value of reduction in lung volume of 10% compared to patients of the same age who never had COVID. A chest CT negative for inflammatory findings may induce clinicians to attribute Long COVID mild respiratory symptoms to anxiety, especially in young patients. Our study brings us beyond appearances and beyond the classic radiological signs, introducing a quantitative evaluation of lung volumes in these patients. It is hard to establish to what extent this finding may contribute to Long COVID symptoms, but this is another step to gain a wider knowledge of the potential long-term effects caused by this new virus. MDPI 2023-06-30 /pmc/articles/PMC10366757/ /pubmed/37489469 http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/tomography9040101 Text en © 2023 by the authors. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/Licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland. This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) license (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/).
spellingShingle Article
Bellini, Davide
Capodiferro, Paola
Vicini, Simone
Rengo, Marco
Carbone, Iacopo
Long COVID in Young Patients: Impact on Lung Volume Evaluated Using Multidetector CT
title Long COVID in Young Patients: Impact on Lung Volume Evaluated Using Multidetector CT
title_full Long COVID in Young Patients: Impact on Lung Volume Evaluated Using Multidetector CT
title_fullStr Long COVID in Young Patients: Impact on Lung Volume Evaluated Using Multidetector CT
title_full_unstemmed Long COVID in Young Patients: Impact on Lung Volume Evaluated Using Multidetector CT
title_short Long COVID in Young Patients: Impact on Lung Volume Evaluated Using Multidetector CT
title_sort long covid in young patients: impact on lung volume evaluated using multidetector ct
topic Article
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC10366757/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/37489469
http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/tomography9040101
work_keys_str_mv AT bellinidavide longcovidinyoungpatientsimpactonlungvolumeevaluatedusingmultidetectorct
AT capodiferropaola longcovidinyoungpatientsimpactonlungvolumeevaluatedusingmultidetectorct
AT vicinisimone longcovidinyoungpatientsimpactonlungvolumeevaluatedusingmultidetectorct
AT rengomarco longcovidinyoungpatientsimpactonlungvolumeevaluatedusingmultidetectorct
AT carboneiacopo longcovidinyoungpatientsimpactonlungvolumeevaluatedusingmultidetectorct