MacKinnon, Cassandra, Castro-Barquero, Cassandra, Kontis, Alexandra et al. · Canadian journal of occupational therapy. Revue canadienne d'ergotherapie · 2025 · DOI
This study asked rehabilitation professionals in Quebec about their experiences helping people with long COVID return to work. The professionals emphasized that education, gradually increasing activity, and self-management are the most helpful approaches, but they noted that returning to work is very difficult without workplace accommodations and proper support for managing post-exertional malaise (when symptoms worsen after activity).
This study provides clinician and rehabilitation professional perspectives on what works and what barriers exist in helping ME/CFS patients return to work—a critical outcome measure for functional recovery. Understanding these professional viewpoints can inform better clinical guidelines, workplace policies, and patient support strategies tailored to the unique challenges of post-exertional malaise.
This study does not establish causal relationships between specific interventions and RTW success, nor does it provide patient outcome data or comparative effectiveness evidence. It captures professional opinions and experiences rather than quantified clinical efficacy data, and the small sample size limits generalizability beyond the Quebec rehabilitation context.
About the PEM badge: “PEM required” means post-exertional malaise was an explicit required diagnostic criterion for participant inclusion in this study — not that PEM was studied, observed, or discussed. Studies using criteria that do not require PEM (e.g. Fukuda, Oxford) are tagged “PEM not required”. How the atlas works →
Spotted an error in this entry? Report it →