MedPageToday The 33-year-old man told doctors that for the past 6 months, his legs would feel progressively heavy, tingly, and itchy, and then would become “dusky” in color, according to medical student Nafi Iftekhar and Manoj Sivan, MD, of the Leeds Institute of Rheumatic and Musculoskeletal Medicine at the University of Leeds in England.
In addition, a petechial rash would occasionally appear on his feet, they reported. His legs would return to a normal color and the symptoms would go away when he would lay down.
Iftekhar and Sivan diagnosed the patient with “dysautonomia secondary to SARS-CoV-2 infection and associated with long COVID.”
They explained the leg discoloration was acrocyanosis, or venous pooling and cutaneous ischemia, and suggested he increase his fluid and salt intake, and do muscle strengthening exercises.
“[C]linicians may not be aware of the link between acrocyanosis and long COVID,” Sivan said in a statement. “We need to ensure that there is more awareness of dysautonomia in long COVID so that clinicians have the tools they need to manage patients appropriately.”