January 2022

Canadian Respiratory Research Network (CRRN) researchers are studying how and in what way COVID-19 impacts the lungs, and why some people are affected and others are not. They plan to study a large national representative sample of people with COVID-19—some who needed hospitalization but most who did not. Through telephone questionnaires, they will determine their respiratory symptom burden, quality of life and medical history. The CRRN team will invite random patients with either high or low burden of disease, as well as patients who were infected with different COVID variants, to one of our 12 Canadian testing centres where they will compare the results of in depth breathing tests, imaging and blood-work to understand how the virus differentially affected their lungs. They will also do immunological and inflammatory testing to understand why some people suffered lung damage and others did not. 

The information CRRN collects and analyze will help patients and health care providers understand how and why COVID affects the lungs and how it should be treated. It will also reveal how different COVID variants affect the lungs. The researchers will use this new knowledge to write a formal guide on what respiratory monitoring and testing should be done after COVID-19 infection. This will ensure that people affected by COVID get the care they need to maintain lung health.