Neurological manifestations in adult and pediatric patients with COVID-19: A systematic review and meta-analysis

Abstract

Background and aim: In light of evidence for the possible long-term effects of Covid-19 on the nervous system, the aim of present study was   to evaluate the Neurological manifestations in adult and pediatric patients with COVID-19.

 Method: The present study is based on PRISMA guidelines, which includes all articles published in international databases such as PubMed, Scopus, Science Direct and Embase between January 2019 and May 2022.  95% confidence interval was done with fixed effect model and inverse variance method.  Analysis of data collected from selected studies was done using STATA.V16 software.

 Result: In the initial review, the abstracts of 730 studies were reviewed, the full text of 249 studies was reviewed by two authors and finally, 16 studies were selected. Proportions of headache, Myalgia and Dizziness associated with COVID-19 infection was 12% (effect size: 0.12; 95% CI, -0.16 to 0.40), 20% (effect size: 0.20; 95% CI, -0.06 to 0.46) and 9% (effect size: 0.9; 95% CI, -0.40 to 0.48).

 Conclusion: The meta-analysis of the present study shows that the incidence of neurological symptoms such as headache and myalgia in Covid-19 patients is higher than other neurological symptoms.