UI Health establishes Post-COVID Clinic

A clinic at UI Health is now supporting patients who experience ongoing symptoms weeks and months after having COVID-19, a condition often referred to as “Long COVID.”

Long COVID is emerging as a serious health condition that can cause a prolonged reduction in quality of life and physical and mental health challenges. According to the National Institutes of Health, Long COVID can include fatigue, shortness of breath, brain fog, sleep disorders, fevers, gastrointestinal symptoms, anxiety and depression. Experts say these post-COVID conditions affect all age ranges, even children, and that the symptoms are often debilitating.

The UI Health Post-COVID Clinic aims to provide “long hauler” patients — those experiencing Long COVID — with access to a dedicated care navigator who can facilitate access to multiple specialists from neurology, immunology, pulmonology, and several other disciplines that may help to address symptoms and support full recovery. This means the patient does not have to worry about finding and making appointments with different offices on their own.

“While we continue to focus efforts on getting all patients vaccinated to prevent COVID-related diseases, we know that our patients who have long COVID are suffering. Our goal is to bring them easy access to the primary and specialty care that they need,” said Dr. Jonathan Radosta, associate professor of clinical medicine at the University of Illinois Chicago and chief medical officer for ambulatory clinics at UI Health, which is UIC’s health system.

According to Radosta, the clinic is designed to help patients who have new symptoms lasting at least 30 days after a COVID-19 infection. These symptoms could be things like depression, fatigue, weakness, difficulty concentrating, shortness of breath, or headaches, for example.

The UI Health clinic is one of a number of ongoing efforts by UIC experts to address Long COVID. UIC experts are also developing clinical research protocols to better understand Long COVID in urban and rural communities and vulnerable patient populations and to test and develop various care-, technology-, and drug-based interventions.

How to make an appointment at the Post-COVID Clinic

Call 866-600-2273 to schedule an appointment with a primary care doctor at UI Health. More information about UI Health’s Post-COVID Clinic is available at UIHealth.Care.