COVID -19 can cause lasting damage to your blood vessels – even if your case is soft and you recover without going to the hospital.
A new study has examined the health of blood vessels, a key indicator of the risk of heart disease, in 2,390 adults from 16 different countries. The experiences of the participants fell into one of the four categories:
- Never had covid-19
- Mild cob
- Hospitalized with COVID-19
- COVID-19 severe treated in an intensive care unit (USI)
The researchers measured the supposedly vascular age of each person – or the flexibility and the effectiveness of their blood vessels – with what is called a pulse wave speed test. Higher speed measurements indicate that blood vessels become more rigid and less effective.
Why would the cocoan be more difficult for the blood vessels of women?
The study was not designed to prove how COVVI-19 can damage blood vessels or cause vascular aging. But scientists have theories.
Women have a different immune response to COVVI-19 than men, which can improve their ratings of survival, but also expose them to potential damage to the blood vessels, explains the author of the main study, Rosa Maria Bruno, MD, PHD, professor of pharmacology at Paris University in France.
“Women are riding a faster and robust immune response, which can protect them from infections,” said Dr. Bruno. “Indeed, men have higher mortality rates after an acute infection.”
But the more powerful immune response of women can take longer to deactivate, potentially exposing their blood vessels to a sustained immune response which leads to narrowing, stiffening and premature aging, says Bruno.
Light elderly blood verifiers 5 years; Time for intensive care, 10 years old
Compared to women who have never had covid-19, those with light cases have had average speed measures of pulse waves which were 0.55 meters per second, an assessment of how long it takes blood to travel between the artery near the neck to a leg.
An increase of approximately 0.5 meters per second in the time it takes to move in the arteries is the equivalent of the aging of the blood vessels of about five years in a woman of 60 years, according to the study.
The measure was 0.60 meters per second higher in women hospitalized with COVID and 1.09 meters per second plus in women who spent time in USI.
Vaccinated people seemed to peel less vascular aging than their non -vaccinated counterparts, says Bruno.
This could be due to the fact that vaccination has contributed to reducing the severity of infections, explains Behnood Bikdeli, MD, assistant professor at the Harvard Medical School and associate doctor in cardiovascular medicine in Brigham and Women’s Hospital of Boston.
“Less the infection and its resulting inflammation, it is likely, it is likely that a person is developing serious vascular damage,” said Dr. Bikdeli, who was not involved in the new study.
One of the limits of the study is that the participants registered six months after an acute era of Covid, which excluded people who had the most serious cases and died before the six -month mark.
Vascular aging is reversible
The good news is that it is easy to detect and treat accelerated vascular aging, says Bruno. A simple blood pressure test can be sufficient.
“Vascular aging can be reversed with widely available treatments, such as physical activity, or hypotestric drugs and hypocholesterolemic”, explains Bruno. “For people with accelerated vascular aging, whether induced by COVID-19 or not, it is important to do everything possible to reduce the risk of heart attacks and lines.”
