Respiratory sequelae of COVID-19: pulmonary and extrapulmonary origins, and approaches to clinical care and rehabilitation.

Although the exact prevalence of post-COVID-19 condition (also known as long COVID) is unknown, more than a third of patients with COVID-19 develop symptoms that persist for more than 3 months after SARS-CoV-2 infection. These sequelae are highly heterogeneous in nature and adversely affect multiple biological systems, although breathlessness is a frequently cited symptom. Specific pulmonary sequelae, including pulmonary fibrosis and thromboembolic disease, need careful assessment and might require particular investigations and treatments. COVID-19 outcomes in people with pre-existing respiratory conditions vary according to the nature and severity of the respiratory disease and how well it is controlled. Extrapulmonary complications such as reduced exercise tolerance and frailty might contribute to breathlessness in post-COVID-19 condition. Non-pharmacological therapeutic options, including adapted pulmonary rehabilitation programmes and physiotherapy techniques for breathing management, might help to attenuate breathlessness in people with post-COVID-19 condition. Further research is needed to understand the origins and course of respiratory symptoms and to develop effective therapeutic and rehabilitative strategies.

The effect of COVID rehabilitation for ongoing symptoms Post HOSPitalisation with COVID-19 (PHOSP-R): protocol for a randomised parallel group controlled trial on behalf of the PHOSP consortium.

INTRODUCTION: Many adults hospitalised with COVID-19 have persistent symptoms such as fatigue, breathlessness and brain fog that limit day-to-day activities. These symptoms can last over 2 years. Whilst there is limited controlled studies on interventions that can support those with ongoing symptoms, there has been some promise in rehabilitation interventions in improving function and symptoms either using face-to-face or digital methods, but evidence remains limited and these studies often lack a control group. METHODS AND ANALYSIS: This is a nested single-blind, parallel group, randomised control trial with embedded qualitative evaluation comparing rehabilitation (face-to-face or digital) to usual care and conducted within the PHOSP-COVID study. The aim of this study is to determine the effectiveness of rehabilitation interventions on exercise capacity, quality of life and symptoms such as breathlessness and fatigue. The primary outcome is the Incremental Shuttle Walking Test following the eight week intervention phase. Secondary outcomes include measures of function, strength and subjective assessment of symptoms. Blood inflammatory markers and muscle biopsies are an exploratory outcome. The interventions last eight weeks and combine symptom-titrated exercise therapy, symptom management and education delivered either in a face-to-face setting or through a digital platform ( www.yourcovidrecovery.nhs.uk ). The proposed sample size is 159 participants, and data will be intention-to-treat analyses comparing rehabilitation (face-to-face or digital) to usual care. ETHICS AND DISSEMINATION: Ethical approval was gained as part of the PHOSP-COVID study by Yorkshire and the Humber Leeds West Research NHS Ethics Committee, and the study was prospectively registered on the ISRCTN trial registry (ISRCTN13293865). Results will be disseminated to stakeholders, including patients and members of the public, and published in appropriate journals. Strengths and limitations of this study • This protocol utilises two interventions to support those with ongoing symptoms of COVID-19 • This is a two-centre parallel-group randomised controlled trial • The protocol has been supported by patient and public involvement groups who identified treatments of symptoms and activity limitation as a top priority.

Public Use of the "Your COVID Recovery" Website Designed to Help Individuals Manage Their COVID-19 Recovery: Observational Study.

BACKGROUND: At the start of the COVID-19 pandemic, unprecedented pressure was placed on health care services globally. An opportunity to alleviate this pressure was to introduce a digital health platform that provided COVID-19-related advice and helped individuals understand and manage their COVID-19 symptoms. Therefore, in July 2020, the Your COVID Recovery website was launched by the National Health Service of England with the aim of creating a practical tool that provides advice and support to individuals recovering from COVID-19. The website includes information on many of the key COVID-19 symptoms. To date, public use of the Your COVID Recovery website and user behavior remain unknown. However, this information is likely to afford insight into the impact of the website and most commonly experienced COVID-19 symptoms. OBJECTIVE: This study aimed to evaluate public use of the Your COVID Recovery website, a digital health platform that provides support to individuals recovering from COVID-19, and determine user behavior during its first year of operation. METHODS: Google Analytics software that was integrated into the Your COVID Recovery website was used to assess website use and user behavior between July 31, 2020, and July 31, 2021. Variables that were tracked included the number of users, user country of residence, traffic source, number of page views, number of session views, and mean session duration. User data were compared to COVID-19 case data downloaded from the UK government's website. RESULTS: During the study period, 2,062,394 users accessed the Your COVID Recovery website. The majority of users were located in the United Kingdom (1,265,061/2,062,394, 61.30%) and accessed the website via a search engine (1,443,057/2,062,394, 69.97%). The number of daily website users (n=15,298) peaked on January 18, 2021, during the second wave of COVID-19 in the United Kingdom. The most frequently visited pages after the home page were for the following COVID-19 symptoms: Cough (n=550,190, 12.17%), Fatigue (n=432,421, 9.56%), Musculoskeletal pain (n=406,859, 9.00%), Taste and smell (n=270,599, 5.98%), and Breathlessness (n=203,136, 4.49%). The average session duration was 1 minute 13 seconds. CONCLUSIONS: A large cohort of individuals actively sought help with their COVID-19 recovery from the website, championing the potential of this tool to target an unmet health care need. User behavior demonstrated that individuals were primarily seeking advice on how to relieve and manage COVID-19 symptoms, especially symptoms of cough, fatigue, and musculoskeletal pain. COVID-19 rehabilitation programs should use the results of this study to ensure that the program content meets the needs of the post-COVID-19 population.

Early experiences of the Your COVID Recovery® digital programme for individuals with long COVID.

OBJECTIVES: To describe the early data from the Your COVID Recovery® digital programme and to explore the data collected from two embedded outcome measures. DESIGN: Observational. SETTING: Primary and secondary care (England-Online). PARTICIPANTS: 110 individuals completed the programme (68.1% female, 88.1% White British, age: 46.3 (10.8) years, weight: 86.5 (21.1) kg, height: 169.3 (10.0) cm). 47.2% of patients reported comorbidities. INTERVENTION: Following an assessment by a healthcare professional, individuals with long COVID were offered access to the Your COVID Recovery® digital programme. The programme comprises of four stages for the participants to progress through. Participants are encouraged to record severity of their symptoms and amount of activity they are doing on a symptom and an activity tracker. Resources and interactive material on managing symptoms of long COVID are available throughout each stage. PRIMARY OUTCOME MEASURES: Questionnaire (EuroQ0l 5-Dimension 5-Level (EQ-5D-5L) and the chronic obstructive pulmonary disease assessment test (CAT)) data were extracted from the site from 11 March 2021 until 9 November 2021. RESULTS: Participants were on the programme for 8.6 (4.3) weeks. There was a statistically significant increase in EQ-5D-5L visual analogue scale (VAS) score (pre=48.8 (19.5); post=59.9 (22.1); p<0.01). The EQ-5D-5L Index Value preintervention to postintervention did improve but not significantly (pre=0.5 (0.3); post=0.6 (0.3); p=0.09). CAT total score improved significantly preintervention to postintervention (pre=19.8 (7.2); post=15.6 (7.6); p<0.01). All CAT item scores significantly improved preintervention to postintervention (p<0.005), except the phlegm item score (p=0.168). DISCUSSION: This early data describes the impact of the Your COVID Recovery® digital programme on the first cohort of patients to complete the digital recovery programme. The outcome data are promising and should encourage uptake.