Robbins T, Gonevski M, Clark C, Baitule S, Sharma K, Magar A, Patel K, Sankar S, Kyrou I, Ali A, Randeva HS. Hyperbaric oxygen therapy for the treatment of long COVID: early evaluation of a highly promising intervention. Clin Med (Lond). 2021 Nov;21(6):e629-e632. doi: 10.7861/clinmed.2021-0462. PMID: 34862223; PMCID: PMC8806311.
Methods: A total of 10 consecutive patients received 10 sessions of HBOT to 2.4 atmospheres over 12 days. Each treatment session lasted 105 minutes, consisting of three 30-minute exposures to 100% oxygen, interspersed with 5-minute air breaks. Validated fatigue and cognitive scoring assessments were performed at day 1 and 10. Statistical analysis was with Wilcoxon signed-rank testing reported alongside effect sizes.
Results: HBOT yielded a statistically significant improvement in the Chalder fatigue scale (p=0.0059; d=1.75 (very large)), global cognition (p=0.0137; d=-1.07 (large)), executive function (p=0.0039; d=-1.06 (large)), attention (p=0.0020; d=-1.2 (very large)), information processing (p=0.0059; d=-1.25 (very large)) and verbal function (p=0.0098; d=-0.92 (large)).
Oliaei S, SeyedAlinaghi S, Mehrtak M, Karimi A, Noori T, Mirzapour P, Shojaei A, MohsseniPour M, Mirghaderi SP, Alilou S, Shobeiri P, Azadi Cheshmekabodi H, Mehraeen E, Dadras O. The effects of hyperbaric oxygen therapy (HBOT) on coronavirus disease-2019 (COVID-19): a systematic review. Eur J Med Res. 2021 Aug 19;26(1):96. doi: 10.1186/s40001-021-00570-2. PMID: 34412709; PMCID: PMC8374420.
Systematic review: Results: Eight articles from three countries were included. All the included studies had good and fair quality scores, with no poor studies included in this systematic review (Good: n = 5, Fair: n = 3). Studies were divided into clinical trials and case reports/series. Most of the studies used HBOT less than 1.5-2 absolute atmospheres (ATA) for 90 min sessions and thereafter sessions were decreased to 60 min. Trials demonstrated most of the patients recovered after receiving HBOT, and blood oxygen saturation increased after several sessions of HBOT.