Russian scientists have defeated the main consequence of coronavirus infection — exercise intolerance. This is reported by the Chinese South China Morning Post (the text is also posted on the American StatNews portal as an advertising one).
A study conducted under the guidance of the chief freelance pulmonologist of the Ministry of Health of the Russian Federation, Professor Sergei Avdeev, showed that a drug based on the active substance bovgialuronidase azoximer is able to reduce one of the key symptoms of postcovid syndrome — exercise intolerance.
As the newspaper notes, today most doctors prescribe rehabilitation or antifibrotic drugs (for example, ningtedanib or pirfenidone), steroids, immunosuppressants and n-acetylcysteine to patients with pulmonary postcovoid complications. However, steroids are generally ineffective in treating these symptoms.
"Antifibrotics can be effective, but side effects are numerous and frequent. So far, not a single large—scale randomized clinical trial of these treatments has been conducted in patients with postcovid syndrome," Avdeev noted in a conversation with SCMP.
At the same time, in the course of the new study, according to him, only eight adverse events associated with the use of a BA-based drug were registered.
"But the most important question is what these side effects are, and how often they cause our patients to stop taking the drug. Our data is very good. For example, in the BA group, only 5 patients stopped therapy [due to adverse events] during the study," concluded Sergey Avdeev.
It turned out that in patients taking the new therapy, oxygen saturation of the blood decreases by 62% less often after physical exertion, and shortness of breath after exertion occurs 27% less often than in patients in the control group. In patients with concomitant cardiovascular diseases, lung function improved by 26% under the influence of therapy.
According to WHO, post-covid syndrome (long-covid) is a multisystem disease that develops in 10-20% of patients who have had a coronavirus infection. And it can last for months and even years.