Bankole, Adegbenga A, Nwaonu, Jane, Saeed, Jahanzeb · Cureus · 2023 · DOI
This article reviews how the COVID-19 pandemic changed how doctors care for patients with autoimmune rheumatic diseases and how rheumatologists practice medicine. The pandemic caused clinic closures, introduced telemedicine, and raised new questions about whether immunosuppressive medications are safe during viral infections. Rheumatologists now help distinguish between long COVID symptoms and autoimmune disease symptoms, and help manage COVID-19 patients in hospitals.
For ME/CFS patients and researchers, this review is relevant because many ME/CFS patients have concurrent autoimmune features, take immunosuppressive medications, and report post-viral symptomatology similar to long COVID. Understanding how rheumatologists differentiate autoimmune disease from long COVID and manage immunosuppression during viral pandemics provides insights applicable to post-viral conditions. The article highlights the expanded recognition of chronic post-viral sequelae and the growing role of rheumatologists in managing these complex cases.
This editorial review does not establish causation between COVID-19 infection and autoimmune disease development, nor does it quantify the incidence or prevalence of post-COVID sequelae in specific populations. It does not provide clinical trial data comparing immunosuppressive regimens during viral pandemics, nor does it definitively establish the long-term outcomes of pandemic-related healthcare disruptions on individual patient populations.
About the PEM badge: “PEM required” means post-exertional malaise was an explicit required diagnostic criterion for participant inclusion in this study — not that PEM was studied, observed, or discussed. Studies using criteria that do not require PEM (e.g. Fukuda, Oxford) are tagged “PEM not required”. How the atlas works →
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