Managing and Recovering from Long COVID: How to get the help you need now

Pave your road to recovery from long COVID.

Long COVID can appear as shortness of breath, exhaustion and fatigue, impaired memory, even dizziness and chest pain. In a timely new report, Harvard physicians bring you essential information for effectively addressing long COVID’s symptoms. You’ll be introduced to diets, medications, and self-help strategies that can help subdue symptoms and improve your quality of life.

You are not alone!

As someone with long COVID, at times you can feel left behind. But you and your fellow long-haulers are at the forefront of post-COVID survivorship and emerging long-COVID recovery therapies. Research on long COVID is ramping up, and much of our knowledge is evolving. Although there are still more questions than answers, you are not without options. This report brings guidance that is measured, encouraging, and realistic.

You’ll find strategies to calm and quell long COVID’s most common symptoms.

Two often cited symptoms are the weight of fatigue and “crashing” after physical activity. With the report, you’ll discover a positive program to rebuild energy and increase activity without setbacks. And talk about good thinking! The Report shares measure and medications to sharpen your cognitive skills and ease mental stress. It’s guidance you won’t forget!

You’ll breathe easier too!

Shortness of breath is one of long COVID’s hallmarks. You’ll be introduced to specific tools and techniques to ease discomfort, open airways, and boost lung function. Plus, the report will bring you regimens and recommendations to ease long COVID’s effects on your nervous system, your blood pressure, and your heart.

You’ll be briefed on the latest research into long COVID recovery!

The report comes to you from Harvard Medical School and experts working on COVID-19 survivorship. In the report, these experts share findings about those treatments proving to be most effective in reversing long COVID’s effects. You’ll read about an anti-inflammatory diet that can give you a boost in fighting fatigue, six self-help measures to calm an overactive nervous system, cognitive rehabilitation sessions to lift brain fog, and a simple monitoring device to accelerate better breathing control.

Insight that is clear, instructive, and focused on you.

There is light at the end of the tunnel. Most people with long COVID eventually do better. This report is written to sustain your patience and keep your progress on track. None of us expected to confront long COVID. But more than ever, there are avenues for addressing its symptoms and promoting a fuller recovery. Don’t wait — get your copy of long COVID today!

Prepared by the editors of the Harvard Health Publishing with Jason Maley, M.D., Assistant Professor of Medicine, Harvard Medical School; Program Director, Critical Illness and COVID-19 Survivorship Program, Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center. 25 pages. (2023)

About Harvard Medical School Guides

Harvard Medical School Guides delivers compact, practical information on important health concerns. These publications are smaller in scope than our Special Health Reports, but they are written in the same clear, easy-to-understand language, and they provide the authoritative health advice you expect from Harvard Health Publishing.

How can you know if you have long COVID? What sorts of symptoms would you expect?

The list of possibilities is extensive. In one study, long COVID patients described more than 200 different kinds of symptoms. Most patients have a common constellation of symptoms, including fatigue, cognitive issues, and breathing discomfort. Whatever the exact symptoms, treatment starts with documenting the individual health challenges you are facing. Then you and your doctor (or doctors) can discuss ways to alleviate the symptoms, help you to be as functional as possible, and support the body’s recovery.

The American Academy of Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation (AAPM&R), a national group of clinicians and specialists in physical medicine and rehabilitation, has classified long COVID symptoms, diagnostic methods, and treatments into categories that capture the common aspects of the syndrome.

This report adopts the AAPM&R framework to discuss the most common symptoms and their treatment. The five areas covered are

Fatigue
Cognitive symptoms (mind and brain)
Breathing discomfort
Autonomic dysfunction (certain problems in the nervous system)
cardiovascular complications (heart and blood vessels).

Reading through this chapter can provide a common language and understanding to help you and your doctors collaborate on your care.

You may notice that some symptoms listed occur in multiple categories, whether associated with the brain, nervous system, heart, or lungs. Experts think it’s likely that the underlying causes of long COVID are multiple and overlapping, affecting more than one part of the body.

There are other symptoms that this report does not cover in detail, but are no less important to a given individual. Make sure to tell your doctor about any symptoms you have developed since your last COVID-19 infection, not just the ones you hear about most often in the news.

What is long COVID
COVID-19 Basics
Long COVID symptoms
What Causes long COVID
Diagnosing long COVID
Treatment: Fatigue
Treatment: Mind ad brain
Treatment: Breathing discomfort
Treatment: Autonomic dysfunction
Treatment: Heart and blood vessels
Preventing long COVID
Self-help for long haulers
Resources

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COVID-19, Flu, and Colds: How to prevent and treat them — and spot the differences

Any given year, we’ll collectively come down with one billion colds and up to 45 million cases of flu, while the number of new cases of COVID-19 keeps rising. In this guide you will learn how to avoid getting any of these three viral infections, and, if you do get sick, what you can do to feel better. You’ll also learn when your condition is serious enough to call a doctor. The report also provides specific information about high-risk groups for whom COVID and the flu can be very serious.

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Managing and Recovering from Long COVID