Establishing a Peer Support Program for Survivors of COVID-19: A Report From the Critical and Acute Illness Recovery Organization

Estimates from the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic suggest that about 20% of adults with COVID-19 are hospitalized, and in approximately 20% of those, severe acute respiratory failure develops that requires life-support treatments such as invasive mechanical ventilation.^1,2  Results of research from before the COVID-19 pandemic suggest that most of these adults with critical illness will survive to hospital discharge.^3,4  Survival, for many, will come with a legacy of new or worsening deficits in physical,⁵  mental,^6,7  or cognitive health in the months to years after hospital discharge.^8,9 Post–intensive care syndrome has become the agreed-upon term for these new or worsening health problems that can persist beyond an acute hospitalization for serious illness.⁸ 

The psychosocial outcomes in survivors of critical illness include high rates of clinically significant anxiety,¹⁰  depression,¹¹  and posttraumatic stress symptoms.¹²  Related,...