Physicians are discovering new COVID-19 symptoms and complications. These are blood clots, heart inflammation, kidney failure, and immune complications.
For example, a 38-year-old patient was considered relatively fine during the first 10 days he had COVID-19.
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"He had mild pulmonary symptoms that he was just sitting at home with," said Dr. Sean Wengerter, a vascular surgeon in Pomona, New York. "He had been diagnosed at an urgent care clinic and it was going fine at home. He just had a little cough."
"Then he just woke up with both his legs numb and cold and so weak he couldn't walk," said Wengerter, a division chief of vascular surgery at Westchester Medical Center Health's Good Samaritan Hospital.
Doctors found he developed an aortic occlusion. This refers to a big blood clot in the body's main artery. It is found above where it divides into two parts to run into each leg. Blood could not enter the iliac arteries. His legs were being starved of blood.
According to Wengerter, it is a dangerous situation that can kill between 20% and 50% of patients. "It just doesn't usually happen in a 38-year-old," he said during an interview with CNN.
Providing swift diagnosis and a surgical procedure to cut open the arteries and take out the clot using a catheter saved the patient's life. "We had two surgeons working simultaneously on him," Wengerter said.
Different effects in coronavirus patients
"One thing that is both curious and evolving and frustrating is that this disease is manifesting itself in so many different ways," said Dr. Scott Brakenridge, an assistant professor on the acute care surgery team at the University of Florida College of Medicine.
"In some cases it's having severe effects on the patient's ability to breathe, and in others it seems to be associated with development of multi-system organ failure -- when all your organs shut down. And now it's associated with immune effects in children."
"It is even possible that the antibodies that children are making to SARS-CoV2 are creating an immune reaction in the body. Nobody knows," said Dr. Jane Newburger, a cardiologist on the Boston Children's panel and an expert on Kawasaki disease.
According to doctors, cytokine storm also leads to lung damage and unusual blood clotting seen in adult patients.
"There is other evidence that the virus really doesn't generate a strong immune response and actually it is suppressing the immune system," Brakenridge said. That would allow the virus to more directly attack organs.
Treatments for the symptoms
A study published in the journal Nature Medicine backs the theories. Dr. Zheng Zhang and colleagues at Shenzhen Third People's Hospital in Shenzhen, China examined samples of immune cells taken from the lungs of nine COVID-19 patients. The researchers identified abnormally high levels of immune cells called macrophages and neutrophils.
They also detected immune signaling chemicals called cytokines and chemokines in the sicker patients.
Sicker individuals also manifested high levels of proliferating T-cells, another type of immune cell.
However, there were lower numbers of CD8 T-cells among patients with the most severe symptoms.
According to doctors, various treatments can help ease symptoms. Blood thinners can stop blood clotting, while immune blockers can manage the cytokine storm.
