Objectives/hypothesis: The aim of this study was to evaluate the correlations between the severity and duration of olfactory dysfunctions (OD), assessed with psychophysical tests, and the viral load on the rhino-pharyngeal swab determined with a direct method, in patients affected by coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19).
Study Design: Prospective cohort study.
Methods: Patients underwent psychophysical olfactory assessment with Connecticut Chemosensory Clinical Research Center test and determination of the normalized viral load on nasopharyngeal swab within 10 days of the clinical onset of COVID-19.
Results: Sixty COVID-19 patients were included in this study. On psychophysical testing, 12 patients (20% of the cohort) presented with anosmia, 11 (18.3%) severe hyposmia, 13 (18.3%) moderate hyposmia, and 10 (16.7%) mild hyposmia with an overall prevalence of OD of 76.7%. The overall median olfactory score was 50 (interquartile range [IQR] 30-72.5) with no significant differences between clinical severity subgroups. The median normalized viral load detected in the series was 2.56E+06 viral copies/10 copies of human beta-2microglobulin mRNA present in the sample (IQR 3.17E+04-1.58E+07) without any significant correlations with COVID-19 severity. The correlation between viral load and olfactory scores at baseline (R = 0.0007; P = .844) and 60-day follow-up (R = 0.0077; P = .519) was weak and not significant.
Conclusions: The presence of OD does not seem to be useful in identifying subjects at risk for being super-spreaders or who is at risk of developing long-term OD. Similarly, the pathogenesis of OD is probably related to individual factors rather than to viral load and activity.
Level Of Evidence: 4 Laryngoscope, 131:2312-2318, 2021.
Download full-text PDF |
Source |
---|---|
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8441733 | PMC |
http://dx.doi.org/10.1002/lary.29777 | DOI Listing |
Microb Pathog
January 2025
College of Animal Science and Technology, Shandong Agricultural University, 61 Daizong Street, Tai'an, Shandong Province, 271018, China; Shandong Provincial Key Laboratory of Animal Biotechnology and Disease Control and Prevention, Tai'an, Shandong, 271018, China; Shandong Provincial Engineering Technology Research Center of Animal Disease Control and Prevention, Tai'an, Shandong, 271018, China. Electronic address:
Pigeon adenovirus type 1 predominantly infects pigeons under 12 months of age (mainly 3-5 months old), causing major clinical symptoms such as vomiting, dehydration, and discharge of thin yellow feces. In February 2023, an outbreak of a pathogen with symptoms similar to pigeon adenovirus infections occurred on a pigeon farm in Shandong Province, which was eventually identified as pigeon adenovirus type 1. In this study, a strain of PiAdV-1 was isolated from naturally infected pigeons and named pigeon-adenovirus-1-isolate-CH-SD-2023, and the hexon gene sequence as amplified and analyzed using polymerase chain reaction (PCR).
View Article and Find Full Text PDFPLoS Pathog
January 2025
Department of Microbiology, Faculty of Science, University of Manitoba, Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada.
RNA viruses have evolved numerous strategies to overcome host resistance and immunity, including the use of multifunctional proteases that not only cleave viral polyproteins during virus replication but also deubiquitinate cellular proteins to suppress ubiquitin (Ub)-mediated antiviral mechanisms. Here, we report an approach to attenuate the infection of Arabidopsis thaliana by Turnip Yellow Mosaic Virus (TYMV) by suppressing the polyprotein cleavage and deubiquitination activities of the TYMV protease (PRO). Performing selections using a library of phage-displayed Ub variants (UbVs) for binding to recombinant PRO yielded several UbVs that bound the viral protease with nanomolar affinities and blocked its function.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFJ Med Virol
February 2025
Infectious Diseases Department, University Hospital Montpellier & INSERM U1175, University Montpellier, Montpellier, France.
Despite viral suppression with antiretroviral therapy, immune nonresponders (INR) among people living with HIV (PLWH) still have a higher risk of developing AIDS-related and non-AIDS-related complications. Our study aimed to investigate the phenotype and functions of Natural Killer (NK) cells in INR, to better understand underlying mechanisms of immune nonresponse. Our cross-sectional study included PLWH aged over 45 with an undetectable HIV viral load sustained for at least 2 years.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFEClinicalMedicine
February 2025
Department of Medicine, University of California, San Francisco, San Francisco, CA, USA.
Background: In a recent randomized trial, six months of financial incentives contingent for recent alcohol abstinence led to lower levels of hazardous drinking, while incentives for recent isoniazid (INH) ingestion had no impact on INH adherence, during TB preventive therapy among persons with HIV (PWH). Whether the short-term incentives influence long-term alcohol use and HIV viral suppression post-intervention is unknown.
Methods: We analyzed twelve-month HIV viral suppression and alcohol use in the Drinkers' Intervention to Prevent Tuberculosis study, a randomized controlled trial among PWH with latent TB and unhealthy alcohol use in south-western Uganda.
Background: The development and approval of novel drugs are typically time-intensive and expensive. Leveraging a computational drug repurposing framework that integrates disease-relevant genetically regulated gene expression (GReX) and large longitudinal electronic medical record (EMR) databases can expedite the repositioning of existing medications. However, validating computational predictions of the drug repurposing framework remains a challenge.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFEnter search terms and have AI summaries delivered each week - change queries or unsubscribe any time!