Magel, Tianna, Meagher, Emily, Boulter, Travis et al. · Frontiers in medicine · 2023 · DOI
This study followed 88 people who were hospitalized with COVID-19 to see how many experienced long-lasting fatigue afterward. Two-thirds of patients had fatigue at 3 months, though this improved somewhat by 6 months, with about 60% still experiencing it. People who had more existing health conditions before COVID-19 were more likely to develop fatigue, suggesting that previous health status may influence recovery.
This study provides important data on the prevalence and persistence of post-viral fatigue after COVID-19 hospitalization, helping clarify the overlap between post-COVID fatigue and ME/CFS. Understanding which patient factors predict longer-lasting fatigue can help identify those at higher risk and inform clinical management strategies.
This study does not prove that COVID-19 directly causes ME/CFS, only that post-viral fatigue symptoms are common and may meet some clinical features. It cannot establish causality or definitively determine whether post-COVID fatigue is mechanistically identical to ME/CFS, as diagnostic criteria assessment is not fully described. The specialized clinical setting may limit generalizability to all hospitalized COVID-19 patients.
About the PEM badge: “PEM required” means post-exertional malaise was an explicit required diagnostic criterion for participant inclusion in this study — not that PEM was studied, observed, or discussed. Studies using criteria that do not require PEM (e.g. Fukuda, Oxford) are tagged “PEM not required”. How the atlas works →
The first block is for the primary paper and is the citation you should use in research work. The atlas-snapshot line only applies if you are specifically referring to this atlas’s reading of the paper on the date shown.
Primary citation
Magel, Tianna, Meagher, Emily, Boulter, Travis, Albert, Arianne, Tsai, Melody, Muñoz, Carola, et al. (2023). Fatigue presentation, severity, and related outcomes in a prospective cohort following post-COVID-19 hospitalization in British Columbia, Canada.. Frontiers in medicine. https://doi.org/10.3389/fmed.2023.1179783
BibTeX
@article{mecfsatlas-magel-2023-fatigue-presentation,
author = {Magel, Tianna and Meagher, Emily and Boulter, Travis and Albert, Arianne and Tsai, Melody and Muñoz, Carola and Carlsten, Chris and Johnston, James and Wong, Alyson W and Shah, Aditi and Ryerson, Chris and Mckay, Rhonda Jane and Nacul, Luis},
title = {Fatigue presentation, severity, and related outcomes in a prospective cohort following post-COVID-19 hospitalization in British Columbia, Canada.},
journal = {Frontiers in medicine},
year = {2023},
doi = {10.3389/fmed.2023.1179783},
note = {PubMed: 37457578},
url = {https://www.mecfsatlas.com/evidence/magel-2023-fatigue-presentation},
}Atlas snapshot reference
ME/CFS Atlas. Generator v1 / Scanner v1.4 / policy v0.1. Accessed 2026-05-26. https://www.mecfsatlas.com/evidence/magel-2023-fatigue-presentation
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