Medical equipment is still strewn around the house of Rick Lucas, 62, nearly two years after he came home from the hospital. He picks up a spirometer, a device that measures lung capacity, and takes a deep breath — though not as deep as he’d like.
Still, Lucas has come a long way for someone who spent more than three months on a ventilator because of covid-19.
“I’m almost normal now,” he said. “I was thrilled when I could walk to the mailbox. Now we’re walking all over town.”
Dozens of major medical centers have established specialized covid clinics around the country. A crowdsourced project counted more than 400. But there’s no standard protocol for treating long covid. And experts are casting a wide net for treatments, with few ready for formal clinical trials.