Pulmonary function and exercise capacity six months after hospital discharge of patients with severe COVID-19.

Abstract

The long-term consequences of COVID-19, especially pulmonary impairment, are frequent but not well understood. The knowledge about sequels or long COVID-19 are necessary, considering the high prevalence and need for specific public strategies. The study was conducted to evaluate symptoms (standardized questionnaire), pulmonary function (spirometry), and exercise capacity (6-minute-walk-test) at30(D30), 90(D90), and 180(D180) days after hospital discharge of patients surviving to severe COVID-19. We excluded in this follow up patients with comorbidities before COVID infection. 44patients were included and 31(26men) completed the 6-month follow-up (age mean53.6±9.6years). At D180, 28%presented still at least one symptom. The most common was dyspnea(17.2%), followed by cough(13.8%), and myalgia(10.3%). All spirometric parameters showed progressive improvement from D30 to D180. However, 16%maintained a restrictive pattern on spirometry test, 44%presented desaturation on the 6-minute walk-test, and 25%walked< 75% of the predicted value. 6-months after hospital discharge, reduced pulmonary function and reduced exercise capacity was founded frequently and more than a quarter remained symptomatic. The persistent symptoms and functional impairment suggest that sequels and development of Long COVID-19 are very common. The identification of these patients to provide the necessary health care is a challenging task, considering the large number of patients infected and surviving to COVID-19 disease.