English
Arabic
Bengali
Bulgarian
Chinese (Simplified)
Chinese (Traditional)
Gujarati
Hindi
Italian
Japanese
Lithuanian
Nepali
Polish
Portuguese
Romanian
Spanish
Ukrainian
Urdu
What happens next?
Most people with COVID make a full recovery within a few weeks, but some can take a little longer to recover.
After your stay in hospital, you might get a follow-up appointment with the service that looked after you. The appointment could be in person, over the phone or by video call. The in-person appointment may be in the hospital you were looked after in while you had COVID or in a specific clinic in your area.
When you left hospital, you may have been given a summary letter explaining your follow-up care and treatment.
Your GP surgery also gets a copy of this letter and will contact you about any other treatment you may need.
What happens if I stayed in the intensive care unit (ICU)?
You should have a follow-up appointment with the ICU team and other NHS health workers.
Will I be offered any more support to help my recovery?
Yes, this website will help you understand what might happen as you get better from COVID or if you continue to suffer with problems following COVID. If you are still symptomatic after 12 weeks, we recommend you have a full assessment at a specialist post-COVID assessment clinic.
If you have long-term health problems after COVID, you might get:
- Support for a specific problem from an expert NHS health worker, which could be in person, over the phone or by video call
- Access to a post-COVID rehabilitation programme from your GP or the hospital team which can include support for a number of different post COVID symptoms – this may be face to face or home-based and may be online or linked with this website
If your GP/healthcare professional cannot pinpoint any other physical reasons for your symptoms then a programme, made up of several types of rehabilitation, is usually helpful. This rehabilitation may address: physical problems such as deconditioning and weight loss as well as mental problems such as anxiety, low mood and post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) as needed.
What happens if I stayed in hospital because of something else?
If you were in hospital with another illness but you caught COVID in hospital, or have had problems in your COVID recovery, you might need support from a specialist NHS service such as:
- Cardiac rehabilitation
- Pulmonary rehabilitation
- Stroke rehabilitation
What is the ‘Your COVID Recovery’ programme?
The Your COVID Recovery (YCR) programme is an online programme that supports you to get better after COVID, which is used in some regions of England.
Healthcare professionals can set up the YCR programme in their service and refer suitable patients on to the programme.
Patients using the programme can contact their local healthcare professionals using an online chat function where they can ask questions about their recovery after COVID.
How can I start the ‘Your COVID Recovery’ online rehabilitation programme’?
A healthcare professional will sign you up to use the programme after doing some tests with you. You will get a code to log in and get started if the healthcare professional thinks the programme will support you to get better. The code is sent by email.
You can ask your:
- GP
- Hospital specialist
To find out if the programme is available in your area.