A new cross-sectional study published in Clinical Ophthalmology suggests ocular symptoms are common in long COVID and may signal a more severe overall disease phenotype, with implications for how eyecare practitioners assess and manage these patients.<\/p>\n
Researchers from institutions including Yale School of Medicine and Yale New Haven Hospital analysed data from the LISTEN (Listen to Immune, Symptom, and Treatment Experiences Now) study, examining 595 adults with self-reported long COVID.<\/p>\n
The study found 57% of participants reported new-onset ocular symptoms following COVID-19 infection. These included blurred or loss of vision, dry eye symptoms, and floaters or flashes of light<\/p>\n
This prevalence is notably higher than earlier reports, which ranged from 7% to 38.5%.<\/p>\n
Importantly, patients with ocular symptoms demonstrated significantly worse health outcomes compared to those without.<\/p>\n
They reported:<\/p>\n
Lower overall health status (median EQ-VAS score 40 vs 51)
\nGreater symptom severity on worst days
\nHigher rates of hospitalisation during acute infection (11% vs 5.5%)<\/p>\n
The findings suggest ocular symptoms may not be isolated ophthalmic issues, but part of a broader, more severe systemic presentation.<\/p>\n
The study also identified higher rates of newly diagnosed systemic conditions among those with ocular symptoms, including:<\/p>\n
Dysautonomia (38% vs 15%)
\nMyalgic encephalomyelitis\/chronic fatigue syndrome (21% vs 9.1%)
\nMigraines and gastrointestinal issues<\/p>\n
Using machine learning modelling, five key symptoms were found to differentiate patients with ocular involvement:<\/p>\n
Dizziness
\nCold intolerance
\nPressure at the base of the head
\nTinnitus
\nTremors<\/p>\n
These findings reinforce the overlap between ocular complaints and neurological or autonomic dysfunction in long COVID.<\/p>\n
Beyond clinical outcomes, patients with ocular symptoms were more likely to report financial difficulties (20% vs 8.8%), housing instability concerns (16% vs 5.4%) and increased social isolation. The authors noted this reflects a broader functional impact, with vision-related symptoms potentially compounding the overall burden of long COVID.<\/p>\n
The researchers emphasise that ocular symptoms should be actively screened in patients with long COVID, as they may indicate higher overall disease burden, co-existing systemic conditions, and greater need for multidisciplinary care.<\/p>\n
They caution that symptoms were self-reported and analysed as a composite outcome, meaning they cannot be tied to specific ophthalmic diagnoses. However, the clustering of visual complaints with systemic illness highlights the need for holistic assessment.<\/p>\n
The study authors conclude that ocular symptoms in long COVID likely represent \u201cvision-related manifestations within a broader post-infectious phenotype\u201d rather than isolated eye disease.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A new cross-sectional study published in Clinical Ophthalmology suggests ocular symptoms are common in long COVID and may…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":564273,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[10],"tags":[64,63,137],"class_list":{"0":"post-564272","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-health","8":"tag-au","9":"tag-australia","10":"tag-health"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/564272","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=564272"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/564272\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/564273"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=564272"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=564272"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=564272"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}