CoChat
Sign Up
Cited by 911Long-Term Effects of COVID-19COVID-19 Clinical Research StudiesCOVID-19 and Mental Health

The DOI matches its Crossref record; 76 of the 78 references it cites were found in a registry or an index.

Persistent fatigue following SARS-CoV-2 infection is common and independent of severity of initial infection

Open access
Townsend, Liam, Dyer, Adam H., Jones, Karen, Dunne, Jean, Mooney, Aoife, Gaffney, Fiona, O'Connor, Laura, Leavy, Deirdre, O'Brien, Kate, Dowds, Joanne, Sugrue, Jamie A., Hopkins, David, Martin-Loeches, Ignacio, Ni Cheallaigh, Cliona, Nadarajan, Parthiban, McLaughlin, Anne Marie, Bourke, Nollaig M., Bergin, Colm, O'Farrelly, Cliona, Bannan, Ciaran, Conlon, Niall·2020·PLOS ONE
DOI 10.1371/journal.pone.0240784PMC PMC7652254

Published version of a preprint

Open this paper in CoChat — free accountOpen PDF

Abstract

Fatigue is a common symptom in those presenting with symptomatic COVID-19 infection. However, it is unknown if COVID-19 results in persistent fatigue in those recovered from acute infection. We examined the prevalence of fatigue in individuals recovered from the acute phase of COVID-19 illness using the Chalder Fatigue Score (CFQ-11). We further examined potential predictors of fatigue following COVID-19 infection, evaluating indicators of COVID-19 severity, markers of peripheral immune activation and circulating pro-inflammatory cytokines. Of 128 participants (49.5 ± 15 years; 54% female), more than half reported persistent fatigue (67/128; 52.3%) at median of 10 weeks after initial COVID-19 symptoms. There was no association between COVID-19 severity (need for inpatient admission, supplemental oxygen or critical care) and fatigue following COVID-19. Additionally, there was no association between routine laboratory markers of inflammation and cell turnover (leukocyte, neutrophil or lymphocyte counts, neutrophil-to-lymphocyte ratio, lactate dehydrogenase, C-reactive protein) or pro-inflammatory molecules (IL-6 or sCD25) and fatigue post COVID-19. Female gender and those with a pre-existing diagnosis of depression/anxiety were over-represented in those with fatigue. Our findings demonstrate a significant burden of post-viral fatigue in individuals with previous SARS-CoV-2 infection after the acute phase of COVID-19 illness. This study highlights the importance of assessing those recovering from COVID-19 for symptoms of severe fatigue, irrespective of severity of initial illness, and may identify a group worthy of further study and early intervention.

Overview

The claims and statistics of this paper haven’t been checked yet.

Run the check — free, no account needed. It reads the open-access text and checks the sources it cites.

A few free checks a day · papers already verified open instantly · results are public

Integrity signals

Registry

Crossref · 10.1371/journal.pone.0240784

Cites

76 of 76 references verified0 citation errors · 0 not checkable

Statistics

Verification

Claims the paper makes

The claims and statistics of this paper haven’t been checked yet.

Run the check — free, no account needed. It reads the open-access text and checks the sources it cites.

A few free checks a day · papers already verified open instantly · results are public

Claims other papers make about this one

Each is checked against this paper’s own text: does it say what the citing paper says it does?

Self-check

Percentages, sums and reported differences re-computed from the paper’s own numbers.

The self-check needs the paper’s full text.

Citations

Cites

Flagged first, then by citations

Show all 78 references

2 of the 78 references couldn’t be matched to a known paper.

Cited by

Sorted by citations

Items 701–800 of 911

Related

See all

Metadata

Authors
Townsend, L., Dyer, A. H., Jones, K., Dunne, J., Mooney, A., Gaffney, F., O'Connor, L., Leavy, D., O'Brien, K., Dowds, J., Sugrue, J. A., Hopkins, D., Martin-Loeches, I., Ni Cheallaigh, C., Nadarajan, P., McLaughlin, A. M., Bourke, N. M., Bergin, C., O'Farrelly, C., Bannan, C., & Conlon, N.
Affiliations
  • Trinity College Dublin (IE)
  • St. James's Hospital (IE)
Corresponding author
Townsend, Liam
ORCID
Venue
PLOS ONE
Publisher
Public Library of Science (PLoS)
Published
2020-11-09
Volume
15
Issue
11
Pages
e0240784
ISSN
1932-6203 (ISSN-L)
DOI
10.1371/journal.pone.0240784
PMC
PMC7652254
OpenAlex
W3102327145
Cited by
911
References
78
Citations by year
2026: 25 · 2025: 69 · 2024: 124 · 2023: 190 · 2022: 242 · 2021: 244 · 2020: 14
FWCI
74.27
Type
journal article
Language
en
Open access
Licence
Locations
  • PLoS ONE (publishedVersion, cc-by)
  • medRxiv (acceptedVersion, cc-by-nc-nd)
  • PubMed Central (publishedVersion, cc-by)
  • PubMed (publishedVersion)
  • DOAJ (DOAJ: Directory of Open Access Journals) (submittedVersion, cc-by-sa)
Funders
  • Wellcome Trust (203930/B/16/Z)
  • Health Research Board (203930/B/16/Z)
Topics
  • Health Sciences › Medicine › Clinical Neurology › Long-Term Effects of COVID-19
  • Health Sciences › Medicine › Infectious Diseases › COVID-19 Clinical Research Studies
  • Social Sciences › Psychology › Clinical Psychology › COVID-19 and Mental Health
Keywords
post-COVID-19 fatigue, persistent fatigue, COVID-19 pandemic, post-viral fatigue, Chalder Fatigue Questionnaire, COVID-19 severity, inflammatory cytokines, interleukin-6, soluble interleukin-2 receptor, peripheral immune activation, depression, anxiety, sex differences, C-reactive protein, lactate dehydrogenase
MeSH terms
Betacoronavirus, COVID-19, SARS-CoV-2, Adult, Aged, Fatigue, Female, Humans, Male, Middle Aged, Pneumonia, Viral, Severity of Illness Index, Interleukin-6, Prevalence, Coronavirus Infections, Interleukin-2 Receptor alpha Subunit, Pandemics

About these checks

Registry, retraction, Cites and statistics results are computed, not judged, with one exception: a printed reference that no index lists is read once by a model before it counts as a citation error. Claims are extracted by a model and kept only when their quote appears verbatim in the text; each cited source is then checked, with a model’s help, for whether it says what the claim relies on. Those verdicts can be wrong — read the claim’s quote and the cited source before relying on one.

Statistics and arithmetic are recomputed, not judged.

Confidence bands are shown only for fields calibrated on our annotated test set. None is calibrated yet, so no band is shown.

What counts as a claim ›How we measure confidence ›How we check this ›

Are you an author, or do you see a problem with this page? Request a review