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Accepted 12 July 2021
Adam Hampshirea,*, William Trendera, Samuel R Chamberlainb,c, Amy E. Jollya, Jon E. Grantd, Fiona Patricke, Ndaba Mazibukoe, Steve CR Williamse, Joseph M Barnbye, Peter Hellyera,e, Mitul A Mehtae
ABSTRACT
Background: There is growing concern about possible cognitive consequences of COVID-19, with reports of‘Long COVID’ symptoms persisting into the chronic phase and case studies revealing neurological problems in severely affected patients. However, there is little information regarding the nature and broader preva- lence of cognitive problems post-infection or across the full spread of disease severity.
Methods: We sought to confirm whether there was an association between cross-sectional cognitive perfor- mance data from 81,337 participants who between January and December 2020 undertook a clinically vali- dated web-optimized assessment as part of the Great British Intelligence Test, and questionnaire items capturing self-report of suspected and confirmed COVID-19 infection and respiratory symptoms.
Findings: People who had recovered from COVID-19, including those no longer reporting symptoms, exhib- ited significant cognitive deficits versus controls when controlling for age, gender, education level, income, racial-ethnic group, pre-existing medical disorders, tiredness, depression and anxiety. The deficits were of substantial effect size for people who had been hospitalised (N = 192), but also for non-hospitalised cases who had biological confirmation of COVID-19 infection (N = 326). Analysing markers of premorbid intelli- gence did not support these differences being present prior to infection. Finer grained analysis of perfor- mance across sub-tests supported the hypothesis that COVID-19 has a multi-domain impact on human cognition.
Adam Hampshirea,*, William Trendera, Samuel R Chamberlainb,c, Amy E. Jollya, Jon E. Grantd, Fiona Patricke, Ndaba Mazibukoe, Steve CR Williamse, Joseph M Barnbye, Peter Hellyera,e, Mitul A Mehtae
ABSTRACT
Background: There is growing concern about possible cognitive consequences of COVID-19, with reports of‘Long COVID’ symptoms persisting into the chronic phase and case studies revealing neurological problems in severely affected patients. However, there is little information regarding the nature and broader preva- lence of cognitive problems post-infection or across the full spread of disease severity.
Methods: We sought to confirm whether there was an association between cross-sectional cognitive perfor- mance data from 81,337 participants who between January and December 2020 undertook a clinically vali- dated web-optimized assessment as part of the Great British Intelligence Test, and questionnaire items capturing self-report of suspected and confirmed COVID-19 infection and respiratory symptoms.
Findings: People who had recovered from COVID-19, including those no longer reporting symptoms, exhib- ited significant cognitive deficits versus controls when controlling for age, gender, education level, income, racial-ethnic group, pre-existing medical disorders, tiredness, depression and anxiety. The deficits were of substantial effect size for people who had been hospitalised (N = 192), but also for non-hospitalised cases who had biological confirmation of COVID-19 infection (N = 326). Analysing markers of premorbid intelli- gence did not support these differences being present prior to infection. Finer grained analysis of perfor- mance across sub-tests supported the hypothesis that COVID-19 has a multi-domain impact on human cognition.
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