Characterising the sequelae of COVID-19

Project leader: Dr Maxime Taquet, Academic Clinical Fellow

During his ACF, Maxime has mostly focused on the combined use of large-scale electronic health records data to characterise the neurological and psychiatric sequelae of COVID-19.

In a first paper, Maxime and his colleagues showed a bidirectional link between COVID-19 and psychiatric disorders. In a second, they characterised the risk of neurological and psychiatric disorders in the 6 months after a diagnosis of COVID-19. In a third paper, they used similar techniques to explore the risk of long-COVID signs and symptoms after COVID-19 compared to influenza. In a fourth paper, they further characterised the neurological and psychiatric risk trajectories in the 2 years following a diagnosis of COVID-19.

In other papers, they investigated:

• whether the risk of neurological and psychiatric sequelae differ in those with prior vaccination,
• whether the risk of eating disorders has changed during the pandemic,
• whether exposure to specific drugs affects the risk of post-COVID brain fog,
• whether people with COVID-19 are at an increased risk of epilepsy and seizures, and
• whether exposure to lithium affects the risk of COVID-19.

Reaching the end of his ACF, Maxime is now combining large-scale electronic health records data with prospectively collected data and biomarkers. This is to better understand what the mechanisms behind post-COVID neuropsychiatric sequelae might be.     

February 2023