Health-related Quality of Life following Mild COVID-19 Illness

Objectives: A cluster analysis was undertaken to help explain reported differences in health-related quality of life among acute respiratory illness (ARI) outpatients. Methods: Symptomatic enrollees (18-87 years) completed the Short Form Health Survey at enrollment and 6-8 weeks later from March 30, 2020 through April 30, 2021. We compared changes in physical health composite score (PCS) and mental health composite score (MCS) across high, medium, and low functioning clusters within COVID-19 cases and nonCOVID cases by multivariable regression. Results: Improvements in PCS and MCS among 973 participants were significantly and inversely related to high function at enrollment in both COVID-19 and in non-COVID cases. PCS improvements also were related to more days between surveys and having shortness of breath (SOB) at enrollment in COVID-19 cases, and to younger age and higher educational attainment among non-COVID cases. Improvements in MCS were related to higher educational achievement and older age and inversely related to SOB at enrollment in COVID-19 cases; in non-COVID cases, increases in MCS were significantly related to being male, time between surveys, and inversely related to SOB at enrollment. Conclusion: High functioning COVID-19 cases and non-COVID cases reported smaller improvements in PCS than lower functioning groups. Not experiencing SOB was related to greater improvements in MCS.