2,712 long Covid patients referred to rehab centre

PETALING JAYA: A total of 2,712 long Covid patients were referred to the rehabilitation centre in Hospital Sungai Buloh from November last year to September, but over 60% of them continued to have persistent symptoms.

Health director-general Tan Sri Dr Noor Hisham Abdullah said during this period, 2,712 long Covid patients were referred to the Covid-19 Rehabilitation Outpatient Specialised Services (CROSS) within four to 12 weeks after infection.

Of this, 984 cases or 36.3% recovered completely from their symptoms, 1,715 cases or 63.2% continued to have symptoms, while 13 or 0.05% died.

“Checks on their medical records showed that other comorbidities factors such as cancer, kidney failure, heart attack, blood infection and lung infection also contributed to these deaths.”

Long Covid is when former Covid-19 patients still show signs and symptoms after recovering.

Dr Noor Hisham said based on their records, about 97.5% or 2,324 of the patients who underwent the evaluation after 12 weeks were those in Categories Four and Five.

Of the numbers, 914 or 39.4% of them recovered fully while the others continued to have multiple symptoms.

Five of the most common symptoms were fatigue (71.8%), breathing difficulty (61.9%), coughing (13.6%), pain (13.2%), and sleeping problems (11%).

Based on the analysis, after 12 weeks, 61.1% did not experience loss of function, 25.6% experienced a little difficulty in functioning, 3.7% experienced a clear difficulty in functioning but did not require help, while 0.7% experienced severe difficulty in functioning and needed help.

He said those experiencing long Covid should seek assessments and treatments from the nearest health facility.

Dr Noor Hisham said 31 public hospitals, four university hospitals and six private healthcare facilities were involved in the treatments.

In the same statement, Dr Noor Hisham said Malaysia recorded 6,243 new cases of Covid-19 yesterday, bringing the cumulative number of cases since the pandemic began to 2,522,498.

“Out of the 6,243 new cases, 106 or 1.7% are in Categories Three, Four and Five while 6,137 cases or 98.3% are in Categories One and Two,” he said.