Long Covid — Pathophysiology and Treatment

Abstract

A large number of patients who have recovered from the acute phase of COVID 2019 (COVID-19), caused by the new “severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2” (SARS-CoV-2), have a host of long-term symptoms. Around 10% of suffer from long-term symptoms beyond three weeks, and a smaller proportion for months. Among them, more than half suffer from fatigue. In the above article fatigue in post-infections syndromes is described. In addition, selected hypothesis on pathophysiology of long Covid and current guidelines on approach in rehabilitation are discussed. Long Covid has a rich symptomatology with a chronic fatigue as one of many symptoms that patients might suffer from. Therefore, rehabilitation programme should be conducted in an interdisciplinary approach to aim to improve function of many body systems. Self-support should be advised, however, ideally patients should be supported throughout rehabilitation process. Further studies on natural course of long Covid and underlying pathological mechanism would be helpful in development of pharmacological and non-pharmacological long Covid treatments. If the symptomatology of long Covid patients would be as heterogenous as in Myalgic encephalomyelitis/chronic fatigue syndrome (ME/CFS) patients, then development of individual approach in rehabilitation might be necessary to obtain high efficacy and low adverse effects rate. (JNNN 2021;10(2):77–81)