How to determine if you may be experiencing Long COVID
Good Housekeeping, June 18, 2022
Unfortunately, there isn't a single test or factor of determination that healthcare providers can turn to for diagnosing someone with Long COVID symptoms. Currently, healthcare providers are often backtracking with patients to document and pinpoint lingering or recurrent symptoms after an initial SARS-CoV-2 infection; it's the main method of determining if someone may be experiencing Long COVID, explains Pei-Yong Shi, M.D., a molecular biology professor at the University of Texas Medical Branch who is currently leading clinical COVID-19 vaccine research, among other fronts. “We currently don't have any tests to diagnose Long COVID conditions; [these] patients may have a wide variety of symptoms that could stem from other health problems,” he tells Good Housekeeping. “This can make it difficult for healthcare providers to recognize Long COVID conditions.”