Post-COVID-19 pulmonary complications among recovered COVID-19 patients: a cross-sectional study from Addis Ababa, Ethiopia

BACKGROUND: The COVID-19 pandemic has been linked to chronic pulmonary complications all over the world. Respiratory complications such as chronic cough, dyspnea, increased respiratory rate, and oxygen support demand are prevalent in recovered COVID-19 patients. These problems are long-term and have a negative impact on one’s quality of life. Patients must be evaluated for potential complications, and risk factors must be found. Some reports around the world explain the factors that contribute to the development of these complications. However, to the best of our understanding, no reports of post-COVID-19 complications have been reported from Ethiopia. METHODS: Facility based cross-sectional study was done among 405 participants selected by simple random sampling technique. Structured questionnaire which includes participants’ demographic, clinical and 3rd month visit characteristics was collected by Open Data Kit and exported to SPSS version 25.0 for analysis. Percentage with frequency and median with Interquartile range was used in descriptive statistics. The association between variables was analyzed with bivariate and multi variable logistic regression. A statistical significance was declared at p-value < 0.05, with 95% confidence interval. RESULTS: The median (Interquartile range) age of participants was 57.0 (43.0, 65.0) years, 63.2% were males. The prevalence of post-COVID-19 pulmonary complication in recovered COVID-19 patients was 14.1% (95% CI: 10.8%, 17.8%). After adjusting for possible confounders on multivariate analysis, older age [AOR = 0.227, 95% CI (0.08–0.66)] and consolidation [AOR = 0.497, 95% CI (0.258–0.957)] were shown to have significant association with post COVID-19 pulmonary complications. CONCLUSION: The prevalence of post COVID-19 pulmonary complication was observed to be lower than other reports globally. Older age and the presence of consolidation on lung imaging were associated with those complications. Clinicians are recommended to consider assessing the lasting effects of the pandemic, beyond immediate care, and should also investigate the COVID-19 history in patients presenting with respiratory issues.