Scientists are still solving many puzzling aspects of how the new Corona virus attacks the lungs and other parts of the body.
One of the biggest and most life-threatening mysteries is how the virus causes "silent hypoxia", a condition in which levels of oxygen in the body are abnormally low, and which can damage vital organs irreparably if not detected for a long time.
Now, thanks to computer models and comparisons with real patient data, Boston University biomedical engineers and collaborators from the University of Vermont are beginning to solve this mystery, according to a "sciencedaily" report.
Despite suffering from dangerously low oxygen levels, many people with severe cases of COVID-19 do not sometimes exhibit symptoms of shortness of breath or difficulty breathing, so the low oxygen's ability to quietly harm the reason for its formulation "silent". Coronavirus patients, it is believed that the infection first damages the lungs, making parts of them unable to function properly, these tissues lose oxygen and stop working, and they no longer flood the bloodstream with oxygen, causing silent hypoxia.
"We didn't know [how] this was physiologically possible," says Bela Suki, a professor of biomedical and materials science and engineering, and one of the study's authors. Some Corona virus patients witnessed what some experts described as "incompatible with life" levels of oxygen in the blood, adding that it was worrying that many of these patients showed few signs of abnormalities when they underwent lung examination.
To help get to the bottom of the causes of silent hypoxia, Boston University biomedical engineers used computer modeling to test three different scenarios that help explain how and why the lungs stop providing oxygen to the bloodstream.
Their research, published in Nature Communications, reveals that silent hypoxia is likely the result of a set of biological mechanisms that may simultaneously occur in the lungs of COVID-19 patients.
Healthy lungs keep blood oxygenation at a level between 95 and 100% - if it drops below 92%, this is a cause for concern and the doctor may decide to intervene with supplemental oxygen.
Using a mathematical lung model, the team tested the causes of hypoxia, and revealed that in order for blood oxygen levels to drop to the levels observed in COVID-19 patients, blood flow must be much higher than normal in areas of the lungs that are no longer able to collect oxygen - than It contributes to low oxygen levels throughout the body, they say.
Next, they looked at how blood clotting affects blood flow in different areas of the lung.When the lining of blood vessels becomes inflamed from COVID-19 infection, blood clots can form so small that they cannot be seen in medical examinations inside the lungs, and they found, using modeling. Lungs, this may induce silent hypoxia, but it alone is unlikely to cause oxygen levels to drop to their lowest levels in patient data.
Altogether, their findings indicate that a combination of factors are likely to be responsible for severe cases of hypoxia in some COVID-19 patients.
With a better understanding of these underlying mechanisms, and how groups may differ from patient to patient, clinicians can make more informed choices about treating patients with measures such as ventilation and supplemental oxygen. A number of interventions are currently being studied, including a low-tech one called the prone position that turns patients on their stomachs, allowing the back of the lungs to draw in more oxygen and eject the mismatched air-to-blood ratio.
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