Verduzco-Gutierrez, Monica, Fleming, Talya K, Azola, Alba M · Physical medicine and rehabilitation clinics of North America · 2025 · DOI
Long COVID is a condition where people experience ongoing symptoms weeks or months after a COVID-19 infection. This review examines how rehabilitation can help long COVID patients, with special attention to how women are affected differently. The authors emphasize that personalized treatment plans involving multiple types of therapy and healthcare teamwork are important for recovery.
This review is important because it addresses rehabilitation strategies for long COVID—a post-viral condition with similar heterogeneity and post-exertional malaise concerns as ME/CFS. The emphasis on sex-based differences and individualized care is particularly relevant to ME/CFS, where women are disproportionately affected and one-size-fits-all treatments often fail.
As a narrative review, this study does not provide empirical evidence comparing specific rehabilitation protocols or demonstrating their efficacy through controlled trials. It does not establish which rehabilitation approaches are most effective or safe for long COVID patients, nor does it provide quantitative outcome data. The focus on women's higher prevalence does not establish causative mechanisms for sex differences.
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 →
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