Olfactory Disturbances as Presenting Manifestation Among Egyptian Patients with COVID-19: Possible Role of Zinc
Abdelmaksoud et al.,
Olfactory Disturbances as Presenting Manifestation Among Egyptian Patients with COVID-19: Possible Role of..,
Biological Trace Element Research, doi:10.1007/s12011-020-02546-5
134 COVID-19 patients, 49 treated with zinc, showing faster recovery of olfactory function in patients treated with zinc (median 7 vs. 18 days). There was no difference in overall recovery time. There were 4 deaths but authors do not indicate zinc treatment status. There was no significant difference in zinc levels based on severity. SVU-MED-MBC004-2020-04.
Abdelmaksoud et al., 7 Jan 2021, peer-reviewed, 9 authors, study period 1 May, 2020 - 31 August, 2020.
Abstract: Biological Trace Element Research (2021) 199:4101–4108
https://doi.org/10.1007/s12011-020-02546-5
Olfactory Disturbances as Presenting Manifestation Among Egyptian
Patients with COVID-19: Possible Role of Zinc
Aida A. Abdelmaksoud 1 & Ali A. Ghweil 2 & Mohammed H. Hassan 3 & Alaa Rashad 4 & Ashraf Khodeary 5 & Zaky F. Aref 1 &
Mennatallah Ali Abdelrhman Sayed 6 & Mahmoud K. Elsamman 7 & Shamardan E. S. Bazeed 2
Received: 9 November 2020 / Accepted: 13 December 2020 / Published online: 7 January 2021
# The Author(s), under exclusive licence to Springer Science+Business Media, LLC part of Springer Nature 2021
Abstract
COVID-19 is a severe acute respiratory syndrome caused by coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2). Deficiency of zinc has been
supposed to contribute to loss of smell and taste in COVID-19 patients. Our study aimed to assess the serum zinc levels among
patients with COVID-19 of various severities, with and without olfaction dysfunction, and to evaluate the effect of zinc therapy in
recovery of smell dysfunction among such patients. This study included 134 patients; real-time reverse transcription-polymerase
chain reaction (rRT-PCR) proved SARS-CoV-2. Serum zinc levels were measured for all infected patients. One hundred and five
patients were detected to have anosmia and/or hyposmia and were categorized randomly into 2 groups; the first group included 49
patients who received zinc therapy and the second group included 56 patients who did not received zinc. All patients were
followed up for the recovery duration of olfactory and gustatory symptoms and duration of complete recovery of COVID-19.
Olfactory dysfunction was reported in 105 patients (78.4%). Serum zinc levels were not significantly different between the
patient subgroups regarding disease severity or the presence or absence of olfactory and/or gustatory dysfunction (p ˃ 0.05). The
median duration of recovery of gustatory and/or olfactory function was significantly shorter among patients who received zinc
therapy than those who did not received zinc (p < 0.001), while the median duration of complete recovery from COVID-19 was
not significantly different among the two groups (p ˃ 0.05). Although the zinc status of COVID-19 patients did not exhibit a
significant role in development of anosmia and/or hyposmia or disease severity, zinc therapy may have a significant role in
shortening the duration of smell recovery in those patients without affecting the total recovery duration from COVID-19.
Keywords COVID-19 . Anosmia . Hyposmia . Zinc
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