Physical Activity Levels in COVID-19 Patients Admitted to Intensive Care Requiring Invasive Ventilation: An Observational Study

An admission to an intensive care unit (ICU) often results in significant muscle weakness and physical deconditioning, which can take many months or even years for recovery. Early and progressive programmes of rehabilitation are recommended to limit any muscle loss and support recovery as early as possible. Patients admitted to intensive care with COVID-19 have been found to require prolonged periods of mechanical ventilation, high sedation and neuromuscular blocking use and as a result require prolonged stays in the ICU. As yet no data exists to examine the specific physical impact this may have, or whether it is safe and feasible to commence this earlier rehabilitation within the ICU for patients with a diagnosis of COVID-19. Our study set out to evaluate the levels of rehabilitation which were delivered in a large acute NHS trust.