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Disability linked to more post-COVID diagnoses in older adults

Among COVID-19 patients aged 50 and older, disability was linked to shorter time to heart and blood vessel diagnoses (time ratio 0.70 versus no disability).

Paper by Esther E. M. Velásquez, Robert L. Phillips, JoAnn M. Thierry, 5 more authorsNeil S. Kamdar · Stanford Medicine
Figure 1. Crude incidence of post-COVID conditions as documented in the primary care setting per 100 000 person-months of observation by disability and COVID-19 status.
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Figure 1. Crude incidence of post-COVID conditions as documented in the primary care setting per 100 000 person-months of observation by disability and COVID-19 status.Crude incidence of post-COVID conditions as documented in the primary care setting per 100 000 person-months of observation by disability and COVID-19 status.Velasquez et al.
Cohort study of primary care patients aged ≥50 years, against COVID-19 patients without disabilitiesPopulations

Limit: COVID-19 severity and treatments were unaccounted for and could explain differences in post-COVID diagnoses

Edited by Boris Djordjevic · AgingResearch.News

Paper
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Primary care patients aged 50 and older and patients younger than 50 were studied in a retrospective observational cohort using electronic health records. Researchers identified pre-pandemic disabilities from diagnostic codes recorded in 2018–2019. They tracked new diagnoses at least 28 days after COVID-19.

Among patients aged 50 and older with COVID-19, those with disabilities had higher incidence and earlier diagnoses of heart and blood vessel, hormone-related, and brain and nerve conditions than those without disabilities. The time ratios were 0.70, 0.91 and 0.52, respectively. Values below 1 indicated earlier diagnosis compared with patients without disabilities. The researchers found no association for breathing-related conditions in this age group, and no associations among patients younger than 50.

Why it matters

Tracking new conditions after COVID-19 can help clarify how pre-existing disability relates to health burdens in later life.

Caveats

This observational study could not establish cause and effect; newly recorded diagnoses were not necessarily caused by COVID-19. It covered primary care patients with visits both before and during the pandemic.

From the paper

Result

… those with disabilities and COVID-19 had higher incidence and earlier onset of newly diagnosed circulatory [time ratio (TR) 0.70, 95% confidence interval (CI) 0.64–0.77], endocrine (TR 0.91, 95% CI 0.84–0.99), and neurological (TR 0.52, 95% CI 0.44–0.62) …

Results

Quoted word for word from the full text on academic.oup.com.

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