Peripheral Immune-Mediated Neuropathy Before and During the COVID-19 Pandemic: A Retrospective Cross-Sectional Study in a Referral Center

Michael Angelo O Su; Maria Leila M Doquenia; Michelle J Tanglao; Raymond Rosales

doi:10.7759/cureus.74131

Peripheral Immune-Mediated Neuropathy Before and During the COVID-19 Pandemic: A Retrospective Cross-Sectional Study in a Referral Center

Cureus. 2024 Nov 21;16(11):e74131. doi: 10.7759/cureus.74131. eCollection 2024 Nov.

Authors

Michael Angelo O Su¹, Maria Leila M Doquenia², Michelle J Tanglao², Raymond Rosales^{2

3

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Affiliations

¹ Department of Internal Medicine, Metropolitan Medical Center, Manila, PHL.
² Center for Neurodiagnostic and Therapeutic Services, Metropolitan Medical Center, Manila, PHL.
³ Research Center for the Health Sciences, University of Santo Tomas, Manila, PHL.
⁴ Institute for Neurosciences, Saint Luke's Medical Center, Quezon City, PHL.

Abstract

Background: There are currently seven coronaviruses that can infect humans and the latest addition to these viruses is the severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus-2 (SARS-CoV-2). Infection by SARS-CoV-2 is known commonly as coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19). Aside from common manifestations of cough and fever, neurologic symptoms such as headache, disturbed consciousness, paresthesia, and seizures have also been seen. By identifying the incidence of peripheral immune-mediated neuropathies (PIMN), early prevention can be made.

Methods: This cross-sectional retrospective analytic study reviewed the case records of patients examined at the Center for Neurodiagnostic and Therapeutic Services (CNS) of Metropolitan Medical Center from January 2018 to December 2021.

Results: The period incidence of Guillain-Barré Syndrome (GBS) for the years 2018-2019 and 2020-2021 were 9.21% and 24.44%, respectively. The obtained p-value was 0.0226, which was lower than the set p-value of 0.05. Therefore, the period incidence of GBS for 2020-2021 was significantly higher when compared to that of 2018-2019.

Conclusion: There has been an increase in cases of GBS during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Keywords: chronic inflammatory demyelinating polyradiculopathy; cidp; dm neuropathy; gbs; guillain-barre syndrome; peripheral immune-mediated neuropathy.