Patients’ experiences of long-covid neuropsychological symptoms: Comment

Dear Editor,

The publication on “Patients’ experiences of long-covid neuropsychological symptoms in Catalonia: A phenomenological study”.¹ This study provides important information on the lived experiences of patients suffering from long-term COVID-19-related psychological symptoms, emphasizing their major impact on their daily lives and the coping techniques they employ. An interpretive phenomenological technique is ideal for capturing the unique and subjective quality of these experiences. However, numerous areas could benefit from additional refining and attention to improve the study's depth and usefulness.

One significant weakness of this study is that it did not account for co-infections or comorbidities, which could alter psychological symptoms. COVID-19 individuals frequently have overlapping symptoms, such as anxiety, sadness, or pre-existing neurological problems, which can worsen cognitive and emotional difficulties. Without taking into account these potential confounding factors, it would be difficult to determine COVID-19's precise contribution to neurological and psychological symptoms. Future research could look into whether co-infections (viral, bacterial, fungal, etc.) and pre-existing medical disorders have a role, possibly by screening participants more thoroughly and/or involving a control group of people who had similar but less recent COVID issues. Long-term COVID exposure could potentially influence symptom experience.

Furthermore, this study concentrated on the experiences of patients in the northern metropolitan area of Barcelona and the Trias i Pujol University Hospital in Germany, which limited the sample's geographical and cultural diversity. This may limit the applicability of our findings to other regions with disparate health systems and cultural views toward COVID-19. Future research could broaden the sample to include people from various locations and socioeconomic backgrounds to further understand how varied conditions affect the experience and management of long-term COVID.

The study's advice to include patients in the planning and delivery of clinical care is significant and innovative. However, it would be useful to learn more about how certain patient engagement techniques are being applied. For example, what practical techniques may be applied during consultations to raise awareness among health professionals, caregivers, and the general public? Creating explicit standards and training materials based on the findings could be the next step toward more effective psychoeducation.

Finally, a promising area for future research is to investigate long-term trends in psychological symptoms in long-term COVID-19 patients, specifically whether these symptoms persist, worsen, or improve over time, as well as how interventions (e.g., cognitive behavioral therapy, medication, lifestyle changes) affect recovery. It might be worthwhile to examine. Furthermore, investigating the social and economic consequences of long-term COVID, such as the influence on job and social connections, could aid in better understanding the disease's overall impact and the development of more comprehensive policies.

What this paper adds

This correspondence discusses on published article and shows future direction.

CRediT authorship contribution statement

HP: 50% ideas, writing, analyzing, approval.

VW: 50% ideas, supervision, approval.

Ethical approval

Not applicable.

Declaration of generative AI and AI-assisted technologies in the writing process

The author use language editing computational tool in preparation of the article.

Funding

There is no funding.

Conflict of interest

The authors declare no conflict.

Data availability

There is no new data generated.