Only around one in four patients hospitalized with Covid-19 had fully recovered after a year, a British study showed on Sunday, which said being a woman or obese increases the risk of maintaining health problems.
This study, presented at the European Congress of Clinical Microbiology and Infectious Diseases in Lisbon and published in The Lancet Respiratory Medicine, used adult patient data from 39 UK National Health Service (NHS) hospitals between March 7, 2020 and April 18, 2021.
A physical slowdown felt
Recovery was assessed using measures of different patient test results 5 months and one year after discharge from hospital.
In particular, the researchers took blood samples from the participants during the five-month visit to analyze the presence of various inflammatory proteins.
Some 2,320 patients were examined 5 months after discharge and 33% of them were examined a year later.
The study shows that the proportion of adults who have fully recovered did not change significantly between 5 months and one year after leaving hospital: it was 25.5% for patients examined 5 months after and 28.9% for those who still had it a year later.
Being female, being obese and having been on a ventilator in hospital are all associated with a lower likelihood of feeling fully recovered at one year, the study also found.
Some of the most common symptoms of long Covid include fatigue, muscle aches, physical sluggishness, lack of sleep and shortness of breath.
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