Out of hospital, COVID-19 survivors must learn to breathe again
CBC
When Akiva Balter was released from Toronto's Mount Sinai hospital in April after a two-week stay for a severe case of COVID-19, he hoped to resume his busy life — including 12-hour work days and numerous volunteer commitments at his synagogue — almost immediately.
The 56-year-old quickly discovered that he needed to learn to breathe again, and that he'd require an oxygen tank to manage even basic tasks like walking across a room.
"I think I was worse than I would care to admit," the father of five told White Coat, Black Art host Dr. Brian Goldman.
During his stay at Mount Sinai, he'd been put on a machine called an AIRVO, which his wife Carmela Balter said she later learned was "one step before intubation."
With his lungs still in need of healing, Akiva's discharge would be the beginning of two-and-a-half months of recovery at home. During that time he was a patient of COVIDCare@Home, an innovative after-care program launched in March 2020 that oversees home oxygen support and other follow-up care for COVID-19 patients who leave the hospital with a long road to recovery still ahead.
It's a model intensive care providers say places like Alberta may want to follow as it grapples with the disabling after-effects of its deadly fourth wave.
Carmela said she believes that pre-pandemic, someone in Akiva's condition probably would have gone to a rehabilitation facility for the physiotherapy, respiratory therapy and other help he's now getting at home.
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