Brain MRI Findings in Patients with Severe COVID-19

A study published in Radiology found that patients with COVID-19 infection exhibit abnormal brain findings other than stroke on MRI. 

The investigators looked at findings from thirty men and seven women whose mean age was 61 years who met the inclusion criteria. The researchers observed the following; signal abnormalities in the medial temporal lobe were noted in 43% of the patients;  30% of the patients had non-confluent multifocal white matter hyperintense lesions on fluid-attenuated  inversion recovery and diffusion sequences, with variable enhancement, with hemorrhagic lesions (30%); and extensive isolated white matter microhemorrhages (24%). The patients with the worse prognosis were those with brain hemorrhage.

                                   

The researchers concluded that patients with severe Covid-19 who did not have ischemic cerebral infarcts had abnormal MRIs with a wide range of findings.