JMIR Publications

ABSTRACT

Background:

Patients recovering from COVID-19 often experience persistent problems in their daily activities related to limitations in physical, nutritional, cognitive and mental functioning. To date, it is unknown what treatment is needed to support patients in their recovery from COVID-19.

Objective:

To report the recovery of patients receiving primary allied healthcare after a COVID-19 infection at a six-month follow-up, and to explore which patient characteristics are associated with the changes in outcomes between the baseline and six-month follow-up.

Methods:

Design: Prospective cohort study. Setting: Allied healthcare in Dutch primary care. Participants: 1,452 adult patients recovering from COVID-19 and receiving treatment from one or more primary care allied health professional(s) (i.e., dietitian, exercise therapist, occupational therapist, physical therapist and/or speech and language therapist).

Results:

Results:

For participation (USER-P range 0 to 100), estimated mean differences of at least 2.3 points were observed after six months. For HRQoL (EQ-VAS range 0 to 100), the mean increase was 12.31 at six months. Furthermore, significant improvements were found for fatigue (FSS range 1 to 7): the mean decrease was –0.7 at six months. For physical functioning (PROMIS-PF range 13.8 to 61.3), the mean increase was 5.9 at six months. Mean differences of –0.8 for anxiety (HADS range 0 to 21), and –1.5 for depression (HADS range 0 to 21), were found after six months. A better baseline score, hospital admission and male sex were associated with a positive change in score between the baseline and six-month follow-up, whereas age, BMI, comorbidities and smoking status were not associated with mean changes in any outcome measure.

Conclusions:

Conclusions:

Patients recovering from COVID-19 who receive primary allied healthcare make progress in recovery, but still experience many limitations in their daily activities after six months. Our findings provide reference values to healthcare providers and healthcare policy-makers regarding what to expect from the recovery of patients who received health care from one or more primary care allied health professionals. Clinical Trial: Trial registration: Clinicaltrials.gov registry (NCT04735744).