[Long-term symptomatic follow-up of patients with Long COVID syndrome]

The primary aim of the study was to investigate the long-term symptom progression of long COVID. The secondary objective was to assess whether any treatment had an impact on symptom evolution.

Longitudinal, prospective, observational, uncontrolled study.

Internal Medicine Department, Río Hortega University Hospital (Valladolid).

40 patients with long COVID (cases) and 40 volunteers (controls) of the same age and sex as the cases, who had experienced acute COVID-19 without developing long COVID.

Scales, indices, and questionnaires were sent by post to evaluate the main symptoms of long COVID. The following were assessed: fatigue (MFIS), emotional disorders (HADS), sleep disturbances (PSQI), cognitive impairments (MFE-30), dyspnea (mMRC), physical exercise (GPAQ), quality of life (SF-36), and pain (CPGS). The cases were reassessed after three years.

After three years, cases showed an improvement in dyspnea (mMRC), which decreased from 1.38 to 1.10 (p=0.014). Ten cases reported having followed aerobic and/or anaerobic physical exercise as treatment, and it was observed that their pain severity (CPGS) improved from 2.7 to 1.3 (p=0.039). In the remaining measurements, variations among cases did not reach statistical significance.

After three years of follow-up, patients with long COVID continued to have similar symptom scores to their initial assessments, and worse than those of the control group. Aerobic and/or anaerobic physical exercise may contribute to partially improving symptom evolution. .