Seizures, strokes on rise in Covid patients, say doctors at Fortis hospital in Delhi
NEW DELHI: The doctors at Fortis have observed increased cases of seizures and strokes in the last one month. Out of these cases 50 per cent of patients had tested positive for Covid-19. Dr Praveen Gupta, principal director and head, department of neurology, Fortis Memorial Research Institute made these observations.
“A patient was brought to emergency with sudden alternation in sensorium with abnormal posturing but he had no antecedent his histrory of similar episodes,” said Dr Praveen Gupta. While the patient’s MRI (magnetic resonance imaging) scan showed a normal brain, he was tested positive for the coronavirus.
“The patient had no fever, cough or respiratory symptoms. He was admitted to Covid ward and treated for the seizure,” Dr Praveen added. According to Dr Praveen, this was one of many such patients who were admitted with the history of unconsciousness and were found to be covid positive and later developed fever or breathlessness. He stated there are multiple reasons for the causation in seizure for Covid-19 infection.
“Seizures may be secondary to strokes imbalance, electrolyte imbalance, oxidative stress and mitochondrial dysfunction,” he added. Dr Praveen stated that the second way that seizures may occur by worsening of preexisting epilepsy. “The direct mechanism include the spread of infection directly through olfactory nerve, haematogenous spread through infected lymphocytes, disruption of blood brain by cytokine dysfunction and oxidative stress and direct attachment to ACE receptors,” he added.
He further added that some parents may have blood pressure fluctuations leading to transient unconsciousness called syncope. This has implications for identifying newer therapies for Covid-19 . “This also comes along with cases of strokes, encephalitis and encephalopathy related to above mechanism. The best part is overall the prognosis has been good in these patients with isolated seizures and Covid-19 infection,” he further said.