Treatments that can help with long Covid

Doctors have found several simple over the counter treatments that could help 500,000 Australians suffering from long Covid.

EXCLUSIVE

A teaspoon of salt in a litre of water could be enough to cure one of the most common symptoms of long Covid – a racing heart beat that causes fainting.

Supplements like CoQ10, magnesium and NAD can help alleviate loss of energy and brain fog, probiotic supplements and a better diet can cure gut symptoms and anti-inflammatories can help dampen auto-immune responses, integrative medicine doctors have revealed.

With most GPs in the dark about how to treat the condition, a group of 400 integrative medicine doctors will meet on Wednesday to thrash out new guidelines for the treatment of long Covid.

Around 500,000 Australians suffer from long Covid which Australian researchers have found has the same biological roots as chronic fatigue syndrome, known as ME/CFS.

The integrative medicine specialists, who have medical training as well as training in alternative therapies, will discuss the latest evidence on which vitamins and energy supplements can aid recovery.

“The doctor’s first job is to make sure it’s not another serious illness, that it’s not pericarditis, type 2 diabetes, reactivated Epstein Barr Virus, that there is no inflammation, making sure there’s no clotting disorder,” president of Australasian College of Nutritional and Environmental Medicine (ACNEM), Dr Mark Donohoe, said.

Nurse Franz Brana attends to a Covid-19 patient. In the ICU-C ward. Picture: Chris Pavlich/ The Manly Daily

To diagnose long Covid, symptoms must impact on everyday functions and include post exertional fatigue, sleep impairment, shortness of breath, fever, heart palpitations, dizziness, chest pain, impaired memory, concentration changes, taste and smell, nausea and vomiting, he said.

Emerge Australia, the national organisation providing education, advocacy, research and support services for people living with myalgic encephalomyelitis/chronic fatigue syndrome (ME/CFS), said long Covid was a form of ME/CFS and “no two cases are the same”.

“What might help you will be absolutely useless to someone else,” Emerge Australia CEO Anne Wilson said.

Patients who suffer from Postural Orthostatic Tachycardia Syndrome (POTS) – a condition which can be brought on by long Covid and includes light-headedness and feeling faint when standing up – can improve within two-three weeks if they drink a teaspoon of salt in a litre of water once a day, Dr Donohoe said.

Mitochondrial dysfunction, which causes brain fog and fatigue, can be helped using supplements such as coenzyme CoQ10 Ubiquinol, magnesium chelate and NAD supplements which can produce an improvement within four weeks.

Gastrointestinal symptoms can be helped by using probiotics and changing the diet to include more fruit and vegetables and, in some people, antibiotics can help within six weeks.

Where Covid has triggered an auto-immune response in the body or reactivated problems like thyroiditis, Hashimotos disease, lupus like syndrome or rheumatoid arthritis, anti-inflammatory medications can help, as can reducing red meat, preservatives and sugar in the diet.

Patients must see a practitioner who knows what they’re doing when it comes to using high dose vitamins and supplements, and Dr Donohoe said he did not encourage people importing their own remedies.

However, integrative medicine doctors conceded they had waiting lists nine months or longer and were unable to take on new patients.

Marathon runner Janine Coppi after contracting long Covid. Picture: Supplied

Ultra marathon runner Janine Coppi went from running more than 50km in one hit to being unable to walk to her letter box without getting exhausted when she developed long Covid in 2020.

She had to take six months off work in the financial sector and enrolled in a long Covid research study at St Vincent’s Hospital in Sydney but, even today, she is functioning at just 80 per cent of her previous capacity.

“I couldn’t walk to the end of the street without having to sit down. It was ridiculous having to sleep all the time,” she said.

Ms Coppi visited an integrative medicine doctor, had weekly intravenous vitamin infusions, tried infared saunas (not as hot as a regular sauna), reduced the gluten, dairy and sugar in her diet, and used a fitness tracker to try and stop herself from overdoing things.

Beginning training from scratch 12 months ago, she ran her first marathon since she had Covid in July and is in training for an ultra-marathon in November.

“I still can’t remember what it’s like to be normal, I still have a bit of a problem with memory, still have to sleep a lot to be normal, I think that’s just how it’s going to be now,” she said.

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Originally published as Treatments that can help with long Covid