Long COVID symptoms can lead to exercise intolerance: Expert

CARROLLWOOD, Fla. - Moving your body is the key to good health, but it may be more of a challenge than it used to be for those who suffer from long COVID.

Dr. Raj Kotak, the chief medical officer of AdventHealth Carrollwood, said they're finding that those who have had COVID-19 can have symptoms that persist afterward. He said it can affect a person's exercise tolerance, their ability to be active and they may experience fatigue.

"This can be after simple activities, even in just going out for a brief walk, 30 minutes or vigorous exercise, they're just unable to bounce back and recover like they used to," said Kotak. "And in fact, it can affect them so deeply that they're just left to sit and try to recover, either release the brain fog or recover their pulmonary type of symptoms of shortness of breath."

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The severity of a person's past COVID-19 case may not matter.

"It seems like it can just be a garden variety of COVID, where it can be a symptom-free infection all the way to hospitalization, intensive care unit level support," said Kotak. "What we're finding is that it affects almost every organ system in some way shape or form. Not the same way from person to person, but it can be really significant in some people."

He said identifying the problem can be tricky because there aren't tests or markers to help diagnose it.

"So, it's really just putting a constellation of symptoms together, comparing it against what they had before in terms of medical conditions and trying to put the pieces together in that way," said Kotak.

READ: Shortness of breath and palpitations possible symptoms after COVID-19, cardiologist says

Right now, there's no specific treatment that's approved by the FDA. Kotak said there have been studies that looked at a couple of medications or drugs, but nothing people can look to treat long COVID.

However, your doctor could see if there are therapies that could help.

"It's really just trying to treat the individual symptoms. Impact the lifestyle, help people get back to feeling the way they used to," said Kotak.

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