Tremor and ataxia in COVID-19

Comprehensive Review on Neuro-COVID-19 Pathophysiology and Clinical Consequences

“…Clonazepam was prescribed and resulted in slight improvement. His symptoms gradually resolved within a month after discharge (Diezma-Martín et al 2020). Ataxia was also reported in Mao et al (2020) study in China with a prevalence of one out of 214 patients (Mao et al 2020).…”

De Novo Movement Disorders and COVID‐19: Exploring the Interface

“…Clonazepam was used alone or in combination with other drugs in multiple patients where the condition improved. 35,38,43,52,53,[55][56][57] In four cases, the patients improved without any specific treatment. 42,45,46 The positive effect of immunotherapy in many of the patients points towards that the pathogenetic mechanisms for the development of some movement disorders, following SARS-CoV-2 infection, may be mediated by aberrant immune-mediated injury.…”

“…56 Authors of all the four manuscripts concluded that myoclonus was probably secondary to immune-mediated brain injury. 35,38,44,56 Diezma-Martín et al 43 reported a case of tremor and ataxia in a 70-year-old man following COVID-19. A similar case of gait ataxia was described by Balestrino et al 45 in an aged patient with multiple comorbidities.…”

“…The selection process carried out according to the Preferred Reporting for Systematic Review and Meta‐Analysis (PRISMA) consensus statement is shown in Figure 1. The published cases are summarized in Table 1 35–56 . Twenty‐two articles were finally selected for the qualitative synthesis.…”

Increased Incidence of Functional (Psychogenic) Movement Disorders in Children and Adults Amid the COVID-19 Pandemic

“…While the neurological and psychological impacts of COVID-19 are currently being studied and many well described to include cerebral vasculitis, stroke, encephalitis, Guillain-Barre syndrome, and others, 1 the impact of the disease on neurologic movement disorders have been restricted to case reports including myoclonus, tremor, ataxia, and parkinsonism. [9][10][11][12] FMD is a common diagnosis in specialty movement disorders referral centers; they can be difficult to distinguish from organic conditions, especially for clinicians with less movement disorders expertise. 8,13 Thorough history-taking often elicits characteristic features such as an abrupt onset with rapid progression to maximum severity, paroxysmal or episodic symptoms with symptom-free periods between episodes (including associated mutism, stuttering, or other episodic impairments of speech or language production), unusual triggers (psychological or physical trauma, flashing lights, physical touch, proximity to people or objects, loud noises, etc.…”