Nearly three years after the COVID-19 pandemic began, the vast majority of Americans have been infected with COVID,

and many are ready to declare the pandemic over. But millions of others are still living with the effects of the virus.

Estimates of the prevalence of long COVID vary, but there's no doubt that COVID can, in some cases,

trigger physical, mental, and cognitive symptoms that can last for months or even years.

So what is long COVID, and who is most at risk for it? What are the mental health and

cognitive symptoms? How much do researchers know about what causes some people to develop

long COVID and not others? How similar is long COVID to other post-viral illnesses? What

treatments are available? And are we getting those treatments to the people who need them?

Are kids and teens getting long COVID or does it affect mostly adults? And finally, what are the most pressing questions that researchers need to answer now to get help to patients who need it?

Welcome to Speaking of Psychology, the flagship podcast of the American Psychological Association that examines the links between psychological science and everyday life.

I'm Kim Mills.

We have two guests today, both of whom are neuropsychologists who work with patients with long COVID.

First is Dr. Tracy Van Orsdahl, a board-certified clinical neuropsychologist and associate professor of psychiatry and behavioral sciences at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine.

She's a clinician and researcher whose work with patients provides insight and motivation for her research.

She has studied cognitive functioning in patients with cancer and other illnesses, and she now studies and treats patients

in the Johns Hopkins post-acute COVID-19 clinic. Next is Dr. Rowena Eng, a pediatric neuropsychologist

at the Kennedy-Krieger Institute, where she works with children and teens in the pediatric

post-COVID rehabilitation clinic. She was part of an interdisciplinary team that recently developed

guidelines to help pediatricians and primary care physicians identify and treat long COVID. She's also

an assistant professor of psychiatry and behavioral sciences at the Johns Hopkins University School of

Medicine. Thank you both for joining me today. Thanks for having us. I'm excited to be here.

Thank you for having me.

...