Symptom variability in female long COVID patients

<bold>Background</bold> People with long COVID experience multiple symptoms which may vary between and within days. This symptom variability can be captured using ecological momentary assessment (EMA), which involves repeated measurements of the participant’s symptoms, behavior and context in vivo and in real time. <bold>Objective</bold> To identify day-to-day and diurnal variation in symptoms in female long COVID patients using EMA. <bold>Methods</bold> Women completed an online survey 3, 6 and 30 months after being diagnosed with COVID-19. Demographics and presence of symptoms (yes/no) were assessed. Patients were also asked to complete a digitalized EMA questionnaire, consisting of 22 items regarding symptoms severity and subjective feeling states rated on a 7-point Likert scale, at 8 random time points during the day for 6 consecutive days. <bold>Results</bold> The EMA data of 14 female long patients with long COVID (mean age 49±9 years; 9±5 symptoms 30 months after the infection, including fatigue (93%), brain fog (86%), dyspnea (64%), and muscle pain (64%)) showed clear variation in symptom severity between days (Fig. 1A) as well as within days (Fig. 1B). <fig><object-id>erj;64/suppl_68/PA4106/F1</object-id><object-id>F1</object-id><object-id>F1</object-id><graphic></graphic></fig> <bold>Conclusion</bold> Long COVID patients experience day-to-day and diurnal variability in symptoms, which will not be captured using a regular questionnaire.