UMMS Affiliation
Department of Population and Quantitative Health Sciences
Publication Date
2021-12-01
Document Type
Article
Disciplines
Bioinformatics | Computational Biology | Data Science | Diagnosis | Immunology and Infectious Disease | Infectious Disease | Microbiology | Virus Diseases
Abstract
BACKGROUND: Numerous publications describe the clinical manifestations of post-acute sequelae of SARS-CoV-2 (PASC or "long COVID"), but they are difficult to integrate because of heterogeneous methods and the lack of a standard for denoting the many phenotypic manifestations. Patient-led studies are of particular importance for understanding the natural history of COVID-19, but integration is hampered because they often use different terms to describe the same symptom or condition. This significant disparity in patient versus clinical characterization motivated the proposed ontological approach to specifying manifestations, which will improve capture and integration of future long COVID studies.
METHODS: The Human Phenotype Ontology (HPO) is a widely used standard for exchange and analysis of phenotypic abnormalities in human disease but has not yet been applied to the analysis of COVID-19.
FUNDING: We identified 303 articles published before April 29, 2021, curated 59 relevant manuscripts that described clinical manifestations in 81 cohorts three weeks or more following acute COVID-19, and mapped 287 unique clinical findings to HPO terms. We present layperson synonyms and definitions that can be used to link patient self-report questionnaires to standard medical terminology. Long COVID clinical manifestations are not assessed consistently across studies, and most manifestations have been reported with a wide range of synonyms by different authors. Across at least 10 cohorts, authors reported 31 unique clinical features corresponding to HPO terms; the most commonly reported feature was Fatigue (median 45.1%) and the least commonly reported was Nausea (median 3.9%), but the reported percentages varied widely between studies.
INTERPRETATION: Translating long COVID manifestations into computable HPO terms will improve analysis, data capture, and classification of long COVID patients. If researchers, clinicians, and patients share a common language, then studies can be compared/pooled more effectively. Furthermore, mapping lay terminology to HPO will help patients assist clinicians and researchers in creating phenotypic characterizations that are computationally accessible, thereby improving the stratification, diagnosis, and treatment of long COVID.
FUNDING: U24TR002306; UL1TR001439; P30AG024832; GBMF4552; R01HG010067; UL1TR002535; K23HL128909; UL1TR002389; K99GM145411.
Keywords
COVID-19, human phenotype ontology, long COVID, of post-acute sequelae of SARS-CoV-2, phenotyping
Rights and Permissions
© 2021 The Author(s). Published by Elsevier B.V. This is an open access article under the CC BY-NC-ND license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/)
DOI of Published Version
10.1016/j.ebiom.2021.103722
Source
Deer RR, Rock MA, Vasilevsky N, Carmody L, Rando H, Anzalone AJ, Basson MD, Bennett TD, Bergquist T, Boudreau EA, Bramante CT, Byrd JB, Callahan TJ, Chan LE, Chu H, Chute CG, Coleman BD, Davis HE, Gagnier J, Greene CS, Hillegass WB, Kavuluru R, Kimble WD, Koraishy FM, Köhler S, Liang C, Liu F, Liu H, Madhira V, Madlock-Brown CR, Matentzoglu N, Mazzotti DR, McMurry JA, McNair DS, Moffitt RA, Monteith TS, Parker AM, Perry MA, Pfaff E, Reese JT, Saltz J, Schuff RA, Solomonides AE, Solway J, Spratt H, Stein GS, Sule AA, Topaloglu U, Vavougios GD, Wang L, Haendel MA, Robinson PN. Characterizing Long COVID: Deep Phenotype of a Complex Condition. EBioMedicine. 2021 Dec;74:103722. doi: 10.1016/j.ebiom.2021.103722. Epub 2021 Nov 25. PMID: 34839263; PMCID: PMC8613500. Link to article on publisher's site
Journal/Book/Conference Title
EBioMedicine
Related Resources
PubMed ID
34839263
Repository Citation
Deer RR, Liu F, Haendel MA, Robinson PN. (2021). Characterizing Long COVID: Deep Phenotype of a Complex Condition. COVID-19 Publications by UMass Chan Authors. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ebiom.2021.103722. Retrieved from https://escholarship.umassmed.edu/covid19/329
Creative Commons License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 4.0 License.
Included in
Bioinformatics Commons, Computational Biology Commons, Data Science Commons, Diagnosis Commons, Immunology and Infectious Disease Commons, Infectious Disease Commons, Microbiology Commons, Virus Diseases Commons
Comments
This article is based on a previously available preprint in medRxiv.