Vaccination protection from long COVID-19 and the use of a popular heart failure drug to treat symptoms have been the focus of two recent publications.
A May 25 paper published in Nature Medicine from the Department of Veterans Affairs found that COVID-19 vaccination offers little protection from long COVID-19 symptoms. While it reduced the risk of lung and blood clot disorders, it did little to protect against most other symptoms.
"This was disappointing," Ziyad Al-Aly, MD, lead author and chief of research and development service at VA St. Louis Health Care System, told The Washington Post. "I was hoping to see that vaccines offer more protection, especially given that vaccines are our only line of defense nowadays."
Ivabradine was effective at lowering the heart rate in postural orthostatic tachycardia syndrome patients in a small clinical trial published Feb. 16, 2021, in the Journal of the American College of Cardiology. Pam Taub, MD, one of the study's authors and a cardiologist and professor of medicine at the UC San Diego School of Medicine, told Bloomberg May 25 she has prescribed ivabradine, along with exercises, to hundreds of POTS patients, including many with long COVID-19.
Around 11 percent of long COVID-19 patients report heart palpitations. "Within a month or two, patients will come back to me and say, 'I feel better, my heart rate is now much lower,' and then I start titrating them off the drug," Dr. Taub told Bloomberg.