Covid-19 and long Covid are relatively recent illnesses. The infrastructure for caring for Long Covid patients is correspondingly new. This article provides an overview of information and help services as well as contact points for Long Covid patients in Germany.

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Long Covid Outpatient Clinics

The first point of contact for symptoms is usually the family doctor, who decides whether direct treatment or referral to a specialist is necessary. Long Covid is often associated with various symptoms that cannot be covered by a specialist doctor alone. For this reason, many clinics have set up Long Covid outpatient clinics, which combine expertise to provide comprehensive care for Long Covid patients.
Referrals from a family doctor are often required to get an appointment at a Long Covid outpatient clinic, but this can vary depending on the outpatient clinic.

An overview of Long Covid outpatient clinics in Germany can be found here: https://longcoviddeutschland.org/ambulanzen/

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Rehabilitation measures in case of long Covid

Rehabilitation — whether outpatient or inpatient — aims to treat physical, psychological and social limitations. Many clinics and rehab clinics offer long COVID programs. For more information, contact the German Pension Insurance or your health insurance company. Whether and which rehabilitation program is most promising for individual health should be discussed with the general practitioner before applying.

Some measures that are used as part of rehabilitation programs can also be used alone in advance. The WHO has “Recommendations to support independent rehabilitation after COVID-19 - related illness published”. Here are options, such as breathing exercises, pacing, the correct management of pain and concentration problems, which are also treated in the Fimo Health app - Long Covid.

The Association of Scientific Medical Societies (AWMF) has also published guidelines for those affected and their relatives. This guideline discusses how you, as a patient, can actively help alleviate your symptoms. This guideline is based on the guidelines for medical professions and is intended to enable those affected to learn more about their own illness in order to be able to continue everyday life as normally as possible.

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Long COVID Germany

Long COVID Germany is an association of Long Covid sufferers and relatives from all over Germany. The members of the initiative have diverse professional backgrounds and are trying to improve healthcare for Long Covid patients nationwide with their work:

“In order to sustainably improve the situation of all Long COVID patients, LCD is calling for more education, better medical care and significantly more funding for clinical research and the development of biomedical treatment options. #nbsp; Our key demands are:

• Education and information campaigns for the population, affected people and the health sector
• Uniform care close to home for all Long COVID sufferers based on current medical guidelines
• Promotion of basic research and development of biomedical treatment options”

Source: https://longcoviddeutschland.org/ueber/

Long COVID Germany (LCD) is a good first opportunity for those affected and their relatives to obtain information about Long Covid. On its website, the initiative has further links to various topics, including:

• studies (https://longcoviddeutschland.org/forschung/)
• publications (https://longcoviddeutschland.org/publikationen/)
• Latest news (https://longcoviddeutschland.org/aktuelles/)
• Information for those affected (https://longcoviddeutschland.org/betroffene/)

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self-help groups

Facebook groups with several thousands of members have emerged from the “Long Covid Initiatives.” These groups can be a good opportunity to exchange ideas with other affected people.

• Long Covid Germany
• Long Covid Austria
• Long Covid Switzerland

A second starting point for self-help groups is National contact and information center to stimulate and support self-help groups who also address the topic of corona and long Covid. You can find information about this here.

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