Long COVID Optimal Health Programme (LC-OHP) to enhance psychological and physical health: a feasibility randomised ... protocol, 2022, Al-Jabr et al

ABSTRACT

Background:

Long COVID is a collection of symptoms that develop during or following a confirmed or suspected case of COVID-19, that continue for more than 12 weeks. Despite the negative impact of long COVID on people’s lives and functioning, there is no validated treatment or even rehabilitation guidance. What has been recommended thus far, is adoption of holistic management approaches. The Optimal Health Programme (OHP) is a brief 5-session, plus booster, psychosocial programme designed to support mental and physical wellbeing that has been used effectively for a range of chronic conditions.

Objective:

This study examines the feasibility and acceptability of employing a specially customised version of OHP (long COVID OHP or LC-OHP) to improve psychological and physical health of people with long COVID.

Methods:

This is a feasibility randomised controlled trial. Eligible participants aged 18 years or older who are experiencing symptoms of long COVID will be identified through their secondary practitioners with recruitment to be undertaken by the research team. Sixty participants will be randomised into a control (usual care) or an intervention (LC-OHP) group. Outcomes will be feasibility and acceptability of the programme (primary); and efficacy of the LC-OHP in improving anxiety, depression, fatigue, self-efficacy and quality of life (secondary). Up to 20 participants will be interviewed at the end of the trial to explore their experience with the programme. Quantitative data will be analysed using SPSS and differences between groups will be compared using inferential tests where appropriate. Qualitative data will be transcribed and thematically analysed to identify common emerging themes.

Results:

This is an ongoing study which began in November 2021. The study received approval from the University of Suffolk Ethics committee (RETH21/004) and from the NHS Health Research Authority (IRAS no. 304234).

Conclusions:

Long COVID has a significant impact on an individual’s mental and physical functioning. The LC-OHP offers a holistic approach that can aid people through recovery and improve self-efficacy. This would ultimately contribute to reducing the unprecedented and unsustainable demand on healthcare services including mental health seen during the pandemic. Clinical Trial: Trial registration number ISRCTN38746119.

Open access, https://preprints.jmir.org/preprint/36673/accepted

 

Absolute joke. None of this is even close to be serious.

 

A classic penny-wise pound-stupid approach. All they are doing is showing that they are unwilling to properly treat such patients so they will be disgusted at the lack of progress and stop showing up. This will lead to short term disability not improving and thus translating into very high long-term disability costs.

The fact that they've failed to bother to ask the patients themselves, nor doctors with decades of expertise dealing with post-viral condition shows the true intent of this study - it isn't to help patients.

 

Double irony to the fact that it won't even do that. So they are paying money, millions it seems, to remain in place, as it won't change anything. Shmart.

 

There is something fundamentally broken with a system that allows physical illnesses (including ones not yet proven otherwise) to be researched purely by psychs, especially when they employ trial methodologies which pose risks to participants' physical health due to the investigators' blinkered incompetence. They seem driven primarily to prove themselves right, rather than any great desire to get to discover truths. Seems rotten to the core.