Expanding access to multidisciplinary care for people with long COVID

The UW Medicine Post COVID team was awarded one of 9 grants from the Agency from Healthcare Research and Quality (AHRQ) to improve access to care for underserved people with long COVID.

"This project is the culmination of several years of development of a multidisciplinary team to care for people with long COVID and a testament to the power of working together across specialties to harness collective expertise to tackle a challenging problem," said Dr. Janna Friedly, Principal Investigator on the grant and executive director of UW Medicine's Post-COVID Rehabilitation and Recovery Clinic. 

Overview

The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), through the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality (AHRQ), announced nine grant awards of $1 million each for up to 5 years to support existing multidisciplinary Long COVID clinics across the country to expand access to comprehensive, coordinated, and person-centered care for people with Long COVID, particularly underserved, rural, vulnerable, and minority populations that are disproportionately impacted by the effects of Long COVID.

The grants are a first of their kind. They are designed to expand access and care, develop, and implement new or improved care delivery models, foster best practices for Long COVID management, and support the primary care community in Long COVID education.

This initiative is part of the Biden-Harris Administration's whole-government effort to accelerate scientific progress and provide individuals with Long COVID the support and services they need.

Long COVID clinics

The AHRQ-funded Long COVID clinics will focus on increasing access to care, improving person-centered care coordination, expanding multidisciplinary networks and behavioral health support, and expanding social support services for adult, pediatric, and priority populations through strategies such as:

• Increasing Long COVID care access by expanding in-person and virtual visit capacity, establishing new satellite clinics, and growing provider-based referrals through a coordinated education series.
• Adding dedicated care coordination, social services, language interpretive staff, and group programs for people with Long COVID.
• Integrating dedicated behavioral health staff and implementing behavioral health and rehabilitation group support programs.

University of Washington Leadership

Leadership from the Department of Medicine includes Drs. Jessica Bender, clinical assistant professor, Anita Chopra, clinical assistant professor, and Leo Morales, professor (General Internal Medicine), along with faculty from Rehab Medicine (Janna Friedly, PI, Julie Hodapp, Lindsey Knowles, Tracy Herring), Family Medicine (Nikki Gentile, Rachel Geyer) and Neurology (Payal Patel).