Study Hypotheses
REMISSION
To overcome gaps in the literature, this study was conducted within the “ASAP—Assisted Immediate Augmented Post-/Long-COVID Plan” project [Overall, the project aimed to increase the self-management of patients with PACS to ensure their empowerment regarding their health care facilitation. We assumed that the interventions would be more effective than spontaneous remission (comparison group [CompG]). To account for the effect of a thorough diagnostic assessment, 1 group received all interventions (intervention group [IG]) and 1 group did not receive a diagnostic assessment but received all personal support and digital interventions (active control group [ACG]). We assumed that the diagnostic assessment would help inform subsequent personal support and digital interventions, thus increasing the effectiveness of the program. Hence, we hypothesized that:Hypothesis 1: Patients who receive support from personal pilots and digital interventions (IG and ACG) experience fewer symptoms after the program and have higher work ability and social participation than the untreated CompG.Hypothesis 2: For patients who receive a thorough diagnostic assessment and accordingly tailored digital interventions based on their personal capacity (IG), improvements regarding symptom reduction, social participation, and work ability will be larger than for patients who only receive the personal pilot and digital interventions targeting their main symptoms (ACG).Hypothesis 3: As previous research has shown that symptoms can negatively affect patients regarding their work ability, we hypothesized that symptom reduction over the course of the pandemic will be associated with higher work ability and higher social participation after the program.