Effect of COVID-19 Vaccines on Reducing the Risk of Long COVID in the Real World: A Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis.
Int J Environ Res Public Health
; 19(19)2022 Sep 29.
Article
in English
| MEDLINE | ID: covidwho-2065972
ABSTRACT
The coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) is still in a global pandemic state. Some studies have reported that COVID-19 vaccines had a protective effect against long COVID. However, the conclusions of the studies on the effect of COVID-19 vaccines on long COVID were not consistent. This study aimed to systematically review relevant studies in the real world, and performed a meta-analysis to explore the relationship between vaccination and long COVID. We systematically searched PubMed, Embase, Web of science, and ScienceDirect from inception to 19 September 2022. The PICO (P patients; I intervention; C comparison; O outcome) was as follows patients diagnosed with COVID-19 (P); vaccination with COVID-19 vaccines (I); the patients were divided into vaccinated and unvaccinated groups (C); the outcomes were the occurrence of long COVID, as well as the various symptoms of long COVID (O). A fixed-effect model and random-effects model were chosen based on the heterogeneity between studies in order to pool the effect value. The results showed that the vaccinated group had a 29% lower risk of developing long COVID compared with the unvaccinated group (RR = 0.71, 95% CI 0.58-0.87, p < 0.01). Compared with patients who were not vaccinated, vaccination showed its protective effect in patients vaccinated with two doses (RR = 0.83, 95% CI 0.74-0.94, p < 0.01), but not one dose (RR = 0.83, 95% CI 0.65-1.07, p = 0.14). In addition, vaccination was effective against long COVD in patients either vaccinated before SARS-CoV-2 infection/COVID-19 (RR = 0.82, 95% CI 0.74-0.91, p < 0.01) or vaccinated after SARS-CoV-2 infection/COVID-19 (RR = 0.83, 95% CI 0.74-0.92, p < 0.01). For long COVID symptoms, vaccination reduced the risk of cognitive dysfunction/symptoms, kidney diseases/problems, myalgia, and sleeping disorders/problems sleeping. Our study shows that COVID-19 vaccines had an effect on reducing the risk of long COVID in patients vaccinated before or after SARS-CoV-2 infection/COVID-19. We suggest that the vaccination rate should be improved as soon as possible, especially for a complete vaccination course. There should be more studies to explore the basic mechanisms of the protective effect of COVID-19 vaccines on long COVID in the future.
Keywords
Full text:
Available
Collection:
International databases
Database:
MEDLINE
Main subject:
COVID-19 Vaccines
/
COVID-19
Type of study:
Experimental Studies
/
Observational study
/
Prognostic study
/
Randomized controlled trials
/
Reviews
/
Systematic review/Meta Analysis
Topics:
Long Covid
/
Vaccines
Limits:
Humans
Language:
English
Year:
2022
Document Type:
Article
Affiliation country:
Ijerph191912422
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