Developing clinfit COVID-19: An initiative to scale up rehabilitation for COVID-19 patients and survivors across the care continuum

Abstract

Introduction: Health systems worldwide are challenged to address the health-care needs of persons with COVID-19. After the immediate need to mitigate the spread of COVID-19 and scale up relevant health-care capacities, one major challenge has emerged – scaling up rehabilitation to address the functioning limitations experienced by COVID-19 patients/survivors. To meet this challenge, the International Society of Physical and Rehabilitation Medicine (ISPRM) endeavors to develop a tool for the assessment and reporting of functioning of COVID-19 patients/survivors – “ClinFIT COVID- 19” to assist health professionals to optimally address patients' health-care needs. The first step in the development process is identifying the International Classification of Functioning, Disability, and Health (ICF) categories that ClinFIT COVID-19 should cover for acute, postacute, and long-term settings. Methods: The multistep process to develop the ClinFIT COVID-19 category list involved the development of a proposed list of ICF categories, a survey of ISPRM members worldwide about the proposed category list, and a postsurvey consultation with the ISPRM ClinFIT Task Force. Results: The final category list for the acute care context contains the seven categories provided to the survey participants (energy/drive functions, sleep, emotional functions, pain, exercise tolerance functions, carrying out daily routine, and walking) plus six categories related to respiration, mobility, and cognition. The postacute and long-term care versions also contain the seven categories plus additional categories relevant for the specific context. The postacute version contains 15 categories and the long-term 16 categories. Conclusions: To advance the next steps, the leaders of ISPRM and the Task Force call national and international societies of rehabilitation professionals to join this coordinated effort.