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Thursday, Apr 23 2020

Full Issue

Blood-Clotting Complications Emerge As Just Latest Strange Way COVID-19 Is Upending Medical Expectations

As doctors continue to gain battlefield experience fighting the virus, extremely strange symptoms keep emerging. One of the latest is that doctors are seeing clots across multiple organs, but especially in the lungs. The symptoms present so frequently that some doctors now recommend most COVID-19 patients receive blood thinners.

Craig Coopersmith was up early that morning as usual and typed his daily inquiry into his phone. Good morning, Team Covid, he wrote, asking for updates from the ICU team leaders working across 10 hospitals in the Emory University health system in Atlanta. One doctor replied that one of his patients had a strange blood problem. Despite being put on anticoagulants, the patient was still developing clots. A second said shed seen something similar. And a third. Soon, every person on the text chat had reported the same thing. (Cha, 4/22)

The new coronavirus appears to be causing sudden strokes in adults in their 30s and 40s who are not otherwise terribly ill, doctors reported Wednesday. They said patients may be unwilling to call 911 because they have heard hospitals are overwhelmed by coronavirus cases. There's growing evidence that Covid-19 infection can cause the blood to clot in unusual ways, and stroke would be an expected consequence of that. (Fox, 4/22)

Signs of blood thickening and clotting were being detected in different organs by doctors from different specialties. This would turn out to be one of the alarming ways the virus ravages the body, as doctors there and elsewhere were starting to realize. At Mount Sinai, nephrologists noticed kidney dialysis catheters getting plugged with clots. Pulmonologists monitoring COVID-19 patients on mechanical ventilators could see portions of lungs were oddly bloodless. Neurosurgeons confronted a surge in their usual caseload of strokes due to blood clots, the age of victims skewing younger, with at least half testing positive for the virus. (Allen, 4/22)

Older adults with Covid-19, the illness caused by the coronavirus, have several "atypical" symptoms, complicating efforts to ensure they get timely and appropriate treatment, according to physicians. Covid-19 is typically signaled by three symptoms: a fever, an insistent cough and shortness of breath. But older adults the age group most at risk of severe complications or death from this condition may have none of these characteristics. (Graham, 4/23)

This is part of the Morning Briefing, a summary of health policy coverage from major news organizations. Sign up for an email subscription.
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