Mental health, health-related quality of life, and lung function after hospital discharge in healthcare workers with severe COVID-19: a cohort study from China

Abstract

Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) is an acute respiratory infectious disease caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) infection. It is highly contagious and can cause death in severe cases. As reported by the World Health Organization (WHO), as of 6:36 pm Central European Summer Time (CEST), 12 August 2022, there had been 585 950 285 confirmed cases of COVID-19, including 6 425 422 deaths (WHO, 2022).According to previous studies, healthcare workers (HCWs) have a higher risk of developing COVID-19 compared with the general community, and the severity of COVID-19 is closely related to the health-related effects after discharge (Huang et al., 2021). Therefore, the health consequences of COVID-19, especially in critically ill HCWs, have been in the focus of research worldwide. Hubei Province has the highest proportion of severe COVID-19 among Chinese HCWs. As reported in February 2020, 64% (1088/1688) of the HCWs with severe COVID-19 were from Hubei Province, especially Wuhan (Epidemiology Working Group for NCIP Epidemic Response, Chinese Center for Disease Control and Prevention, 2020). Therefore, studying the health impacts of these critically ill HCWs after hospital discharge is of great significance to the improvement of global public health.A number of studies have focused on the health consequences in convalescent phase in patients with