Oklahoma Doctor Discusses How Coronavirus Could Affect Multiple Internal Organs

According to the latest research, COVID-19 can leave your lungs severely damaged, but also cause destructive ailments to several other organs.

In some critical COVID-19 patients, the immune system is stimulated to a much more intensive level potentially causing damage to the patient.

It can effect many different organs such as the lungs, the heart and the brain.

About 15% of coronavirus patients will need hospital admission.

Dr. Brent Brown, a professor of pulmonology at OU Medicine, described the situation like a war zone within the body and for “a lot of people, their quality of life never goes back to normal."

The body will try to fight off the virus, producing an immune system response that attacks organs.

"We believe this is an overreaction to the immune system because the presence of the virus,” Brown said.

Brown said the virus will get into the body, the lungs specifically, and multiply at a rapid rate.

Maybe 20% of people will have lung involvement and then the lung involvement can be a lot bigger deal.

The body's response to the virus can cause clots to form in the lung and for the lung to fill with fluid.

"In a study from Washington state about an outbreak they had at a nursing home, a third of them had heart involvement,” Brown said.

Brown pointed out that there is still a great deal to be learned about this virus. Is it the virus causing the damage? Or an overreaction from the immune system response?

Even more concerning is the disease can cause numerous other problems, such as "the blood clotting system, the heart, occasionally the neurological system, the kidneys, and other organs too,” Brown said.

Many patients require blood thinners and clot dissolving medications, but some of these patients will still get clots.

The outlook looks dreary, but Brown said this is why it's so important to keep our numbers low. "When they come in in a trickle rather than a tidal wave,” these sick patients can get the health care they need.

Brown said other patients who survive severe COVID-19 may develop PTSD and depression.