S83 An online breathing and wellbeing programme (ENO Breathe) for people with long COVID breathlessness: results from 1433 participants

<h3>Background</h3> Breathlessness can be a complex and debilitating symptom in people with long COVID, and the evidence base for interventions is limited. A previous randomised controlled trial found that participation in a six-week online breathing and wellbeing programme (ENO Breathe) that uses singing techniques, was associated with improvements in health-related quality of life (HRQoL) and breathlessness compared to usual care, in people with long COVID. The impact of this intervention outside of a trial setting has not been assessed. <h3>Methods</h3> We compared baseline and post-intervention evaluation data to assess the impact of the ENO Breathe programme on HRQoL (RAND SF-36) Mental and Physical Health Composite (MHC, PHC) scores, breathlessness (Dyspnoea-12, Visual Analogue Scores (VAS) for breathlessness at rest, walking, stairs, running), anxiety (GAD-7 score), and respiratory symptoms (CAT score). Paired t-tests and Wilcoxon signed rank tests were used as appropriate. Analysis was approved by the NHS HRA Stanmore 19/LO/0418. <h3>Results</h3> 1433 programme participants, referred after assessment from 51-UK based long-COVID clinics, were included. Participants had a mean(SD) age 49(11.9), BMI 28(7.2), 80% female, 83% white ethnicity, reporting long COVID symptom duration at time of registration of 433(216) days. 1202 participants provided follow-up data on completion of the 6-week programme. Completing ENO-Breathe was associated with improvements (mean difference, 95% CI) in RAND-36 MHC (p&lt;0.001; 3.59, 3.14 to 4.05), PHC (p&lt;0.001, 2.22, 1.89 to 2.56), Dyspnoea-12 (p&lt;0.001; -4.33, -4.68 to -3.98), VAS breathlessness scores walking (p&lt;0.001; -5.05, -6.26 to -3.84), stairs (p&lt;0.001; -10.87, -12.15 to -9.59), and running (p&lt;0.001; -9.34 to -6.63), GAD-7 score (p&lt;0.001; -1.69, -1.92 to -1.46), CAT score (p&lt;0.001; -2.54, -2.85 to -2.23). The VAS breathlessness score at rest had not significantly changed (p=0.29; 1.26, -0.016 to 2.54). <h3>Discussion and Conclusion</h3> These results indicate, in a large cohort outside of a clinical trial setting, that the ENO-Breathe online breathing and wellbeing programme can improve health-related quality of life, breathlessness, anxiety and respiratory symptoms in people with long COVID and breathlessness.