Southampton researchers involved in ground-breaking long COVID study

Faculty of Medicine researchers are involved in the largest clinical trial on long COVID to date, involving more than 4,500 people.

Funded with a £6.8m grant from the NIHR, the STIMULATE-ICP (Symptoms, trajectory, inequalities and management: understanding long COVID to address and transform existing integrated care pathways) trial will test the efficacy of existing drugs to treat long COVID and measure the different effects of three months’ treatment on patients with regards to their symptoms, mental health and outcomes such as returning to work.

Dr Nisreen Alwan, from the Faculty of Medicine, is a co-investigator and will lead work specifically focused on improving case finding and inequalities in long COVID recognition and care.

She said: “We’ve seen considerable socioeconomic and ethnic disparities in COVID infection rates and deaths and we need to do all we can to not have the same in long COVID recognition, care and support. We will work within this ground-breaking project to ensure we understand and prevent potential stigma widening inequalities in long COVID.”

Working with Dr Marija Pantelic, of the Brighton and Sussex Medical School, Dr Alwan will lead work on understanding inequalities and uneven access to long COVID recognition, care and support and design an intervention to close the gap.

They aim to increase long COVID awareness and explore potential equitable pathways for high-risk populations as well as characterise the stigma and perceived discrimination associated with having long COVID to develop an approach to identify cases most in need of care and support in the community and design healthcare professional training to reduce inequalities. This will be co-produced with a community advisory board consisting of people with long COVID and clinical partners.