Coenzyme Q10 + alpha lipoic acid for chronic COVID syndrome (2022) Barletta et al

Abstract:


Chronic COVID syndrome is characterized by chronic fatigue, myalgia, depression and sleep disturbances, similar to chronic fatigue syndrome (CFS) and fibromyalgia syndrome.

Implementations of mitochondrial nutrients (MNs) with diet are important for the clinical effects antioxidant.

We examined if use of an association of coenzyme Q10 and alpha lipoic acid (Requpero®) could reduce chronic covid symptoms.

The Requpero study is a prospective observational study in which 174 patients, who had developed chronic-covid syndrome, were divided in two groups: The first one (116 patients) received coenzyme Q10 + alpha lipoic acid, and the second one (58 patients) did not receive any treatment.

Primary outcome was reduction in Fatigue Severity Scale (FSS) in treatment group compared with control group. complete FSS response was reached most frequently in treatment group than in control group.

A FSS complete response was reached in 62 (53.5%) patients in treatment group and in two (3.5%) patients in control group.

A reduction in FSS core < 20% from baseline at T1 (non-response) was observed in 11 patients in the treatment group (9.5%) and in 15 patients in the control group (25.9%) (p < 0.0001).

To date, this is the first study that tests the efficacy of coenzyme Q10 and alpha lipoic acid in chronic Covid syndrome.

Primary and secondary outcomes were met. These results have to be confirmed through a double blind placebo controlled trial of longer duration.

Open access link here

 

I have not seen the full article but I wonder how Long Covid or ‘Chronic Covid Syndrome’ is defined for the purpose of this study. Though it seems they selected patients similar to ME/CFS, the failure to mention PEM, leaves us wondering if their group is as potentially heterogeneous as CFS under the discredited Oxford criteria.

It seems to me that Long Covid potentially includes those with various anatomical and physiological damage that that occurred as a one off event during the acute phase which needs to be either repaired or adapted too, those with post viral fatigue which presumably will recover over time and those whose infection triggered an ongoing condition, including those meeting the diagnostic criteria for ME/CFS. Presumably this study is hoping use their supplementation to address the mitochondrial issues thought to be linked to ME/CFS and presumably those with Long Covid that seem to have similar issues.

I worry that we are going to end up, as with ME/CFS, with lots of incompletely or inadequately evaluated suggestions, but no conclusive answers.

 

It is unclear what timeframe was allocated while on these supplements- are we talking weeks? Months? When was the effect recorded? Is there a longer term measurement planned?

 

If LC is similar to CFS, then why not just ask millions of pwCFS who have taken these supplements how it's going for them decades later?

 

Sorry but why is there a typo on the questionnaire? ("Functionning")

FWIW I have found these particular supplements helpful (who knows) but hardly enough to make the kind of difference we need. I hope we can move on soon from reinventing the wheel.

 

I do really hate how by separating Long Covid as special away from all the other viruses that have caused ME/CFS over the years that we are going through this process of continued replication of findings and testing the same treatment options as if no prior work exists. We have thrown away 80+ years of (admittedly poor) research and are doomed to waste enormous amounts of time and money simply because of the stigma and prejudice surrounding ME/CFS. Its an enormous waste of human time and money and as it stands there are no significant differences between the conditions and yet the split in research funding and ignorance of prior work persists.

 

I very much doubt that vitamins and minerals will be the cure for post-viral illnesses such as ME and LC. We pwME have been at it for decades and vitamin protocols have cycled through and through, same for diets protocols. We are still here.

 

Me too. But having (LC or ME alone) is always going to be better than having (LC or ME) PLUS (a nutrient deficiency of any kind).

 

but unless your diet is not varied and sufficient (say you can only eat 2 or 3 food and nothing else, you are not bound to be deficient in anything that would jeopardize your functioning. I would hope that if you only ate bananas, pasta and peas, that you thought of taking a multi-vitamin. There would be no point in taking buying a bottle of zinc and a bottle of folate and a bottle of magnesium.

Typically the blood work that is recommended for ME or LC is all of the basics, CBC and chemistry, including Calcium and Magnesium, TSH - but measuring vitamins is not typical. But we are going off topic.

 

So you're saying that people with LC or ME could be very low in, say, folate and/or vitamin D, and it would be rare for anyone to ever know?

 

the question is... is it relevant?

 

Absolutely it matters. Having low or deficient nutrients creates many unpleasant symptoms that are easily treatable that people would be glad to get rid of, no matter what their other health problems are.

 

Having low Folate and Vit D doesn't make my ME any better or help new symptoms in a major way for me.

 

This paper is not paywalled:

https://link.springer.com/article/1...tm_campaign=MLSR_JRNLS_AWA1_CN_CNPL_STKRE_MLS

 

thanks, it was when it came out. I changed it in original post.