wakes up with a huge tongue after being put into a coma and lying on his stomach

Another surprising consequence of Covid-19. An American patient woke up from an artificial coma with a tongue so swollen that he could not close his mouth for three months.

Originally from Lake City, Florida, Anthony Jones tested positive for Covid-19 last July. His condition worsened rapidly, he was hospitalized, put on a ventilator, then plunged into an artificial coma. The American patient will remain in intensive care for three weeks, where doctors will place him on his stomach to help him breathe, a technique widely used with Covid-19 patients.

The “prone position” is used for the most severe cases of Covid-19

This particular and very technical maneuver, called “prone position”, it is used for the most severe cases of Covid-19. “The goal is to put patients on their stomachs to try to recruit as much as possible the areas of the lung that can be revived thanks to this maneuver”, explains Dr. Keryhuel, anesthetist at the Le Mans hospital in Allo.

This posture projects Anthony Jones’s blood flow into his tongue, which becomes huge. During the three months following his awakening, the unfortunate man could not close his mouth or speak due to his extremely swollen tongue. “Nobody knew what to do with their language” testifies his wife.

“An extremely rare fact”

Finally, Dr. Melville, a specialist in Houston, decided to operate on this particularly rare complication of Covid-19 a few weeks ago, allowing Anthony Jones to recover a normal-sized tongue. “This is extremely rare “, explained Dr Melville of UTHealth.“We only had two cases during the entire pandemic”, continues the health worker, who nevertheless believes that this symptom could recur.

In the United States, the Covid-19 epidemic is currently in full swing “exponential” Across the country, the American Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) warned yesterday Thursday, November 19. It is the country most affected by SARS-cov-two in absolute terms.