Researchers determine whether coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) messenger ribonucleic acid (mRNA) vaccines increase the risk of myocarditis.
Results
During the study period, 4,635 individuals were hospitalized for myocarditis, 12% of whom were classified as postvaccine, 6% as post-COVID-19, and 82% as conventional myocarditis. About 67% of postvaccine myocarditis patients developed symptoms following the second vaccination dose.
Myocarditis type evaluations revealed that postvaccine myocarditis patients were younger, with a mean age of 25.9 years, and more likely to be male with a lower history of chronic disease as compared with conventional myocarditis. In contrast, post-COVID-19 myocarditis patients were older with a mean age of 31, more likely to be diagnosed with comorbidities, and less frequently male at 67% as compared to 84% of postvaccine myocarditis patients.
Clinical outcomes over 18 months of follow-up were most severe in the post-COVID-19 and conventional myocarditis cohorts, both of which resulted in 4% mortality rates as compared to 0.2% in the postvaccination cohort. Hospitalization reports presented similar trends, with 5.8%, 4%, and 3.2% of conventional, post-COVID-19, and postvaccination patients requiring hospitalization, respectively. However, drugs and medical procedures in all cohorts were not statistically different from each other.
Conclusion
Although COVID-19 mRNA vaccination was associated with an increased incidence of subsequent myocarditis as compared to other disease origins, the subsequent clinical outcomes, including mortality, were significantly attenuated in this cohort. The current study identified younger male individuals, especially those receiving their second mRNA vaccine dose, as the highest-risk population, thus highlighting the need for preventive clinical follow-up between seven and 30 days following vaccination.
Source:
https://www.news-medical.net/news/20240828/Myocarditis-risks-linked-to-COVID-19-vaccination-explained.aspx