Consequences of COVID-19 in discharged patients
thelancet.comAt 6 months after acute infection, COVID-19 survivors were mainly troubled with fatigue or muscle weakness, sleep difficulties, and anxiety or depression.
Patients who were more severely ill during their hospital stay had more severe impaired pulmonary diffusion capacities and abnormal chest imaging manifestations, and are the main target population for intervention of long-term recovery.
In total, 1,733 of 2,469 discharged patients with COVID-19 were enrolled after 736 were excluded.
Patients had a median age of 57·0 (IQR 47·0–65·0) years and 897 (52%) were men.
The follow-up study was done from June 16, to Sept 3, 2020, and the median follow-up time after symptom onset was 186·0 (175·0–199·0) days.
Fatigue or muscle weakness (63%, 1038 of 1655) and sleep difficulties (26%, 437 of 1655) were the most common symptoms.