Some types of severe infections being widespread in the Middle Ages are sporadic now, but we are faced with new and ever-renewing pathogens. The new coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) represents the latest pandemic causing long-term health effects for millions of people. We aimed at learning more about the quality of life (QoL),functional health status of patients suffering from post-COVID syndrome to target rehabilitation interventions in more patient-centered, personalized manner. Data of patients (110 male and 128 female) seen between 01.01.2021-12.30.2021 at the Pulmonology as part of the Post-COVID Specialist Outpatient Network of the UD were collected retrospectively. Respiratory function results, chest CT findings, number of days spent in hospital due to acute COVID-19 together with health related QoL measures (COPD Assessment Test score and our specially developed post-COVID QoL questionnaire) were collected and analyzed. Kruskal-Wallis and Mann-Whitney tests.

Patients evaluated their QoL worse compared to those before infection, but the deterioration of QoL was not significantly related to respiratory function parameters FEV1(p=0.088),DLco(p=0.416),FEV1/FVC (p=0.092) number of days spent in acute hospital care, (p=0.47) or deviations seen on chest CT(p=0.22). The increase in hospital days (p=0.014) and male gender(p=0.02) were associated with worse respiratory function. Dlco only has a significant (p=0.04) relationship with pneumonia.

It is important to detect, treat and monitor impairments both in functional parameters and cognitive status during the care of patients with post-COVID syndrome