On Medical Education for Long Covid and IACI with Prof David Putrino
- Mar 15
- 2 min read
Introduction
In this special episode for Long Covid Awareness Day, Dr Rupert Higham, lecturer in Learning and Leadership from the Institute of Education at UCL speaks with Professor David Putrino, neuroscientist and rehabilitation specialist at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai - and general legend!
Professor Putrino is also the Nash Family Director of the Cohen Center for Recovery from Complex Chronic Illnesses (CoRE), where his team researches and treats infection-associated chronic illnesses (IACI) including Long Covid, ME, and chronic Lyme disease.
Since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic, Professor Putrino has become a leading voice in both the clinical care and research of Long Covid. He is also helping to develop medical education programmes for clinicians on infection-associated chronic illness as part of the Long Covid Open Medical Education Program with Polybio and at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai.
In this conversation we discuss:
• Long Covid and the emerging science of infection-associated chronic illness
• The overlap with ME
• The challenges patients face in healthcare systems
• Why traditional rehabilitation models can fail these conditions
• The urgent need for better medical education
A transcript and audio are available for accessibility on Substack. We will also post short gems on our social media (Bluesky, X, Facebook) throughout Long Covid Awareness Day.For timestamps on specific questions, if you wish to break the interview up or view your personal most important sections, you can see them here:
0:00 Introduction 1:32 What drew David Putrino to Long Covid
4:53 How medical education has failed Long Covid and ME patients
14:19 Medical textbooks and patient experience in books
21:52 The problem with ‘medically unexplained symptoms’
27:09 Why we see optional educational programs
33:10 How to embed Long Covid in under/post-grad training
33:30 Putrino's top three changes for medical education
41:01 How to reduce infection risk
44:27 How patients can navigate difficult doctor visits
55:16 How Long Covid education is spreading internationally
1:00:21 Q&A PEM vs Fatigue
1:02:51 Q&A Relationship between Long Covid and ME
1:05:32 Q&A Dysautonomia, Gut Problems and Nutrition
1:09:12 Q&A Help for diagnosis for MCAS
Cohen Centre Living Clinical Guidelines for Infection-Associated Chronic Conditions and Illnesses on HSS Website
Special thanks to Prof Putrino for his time and insight that he shared with the community. Medical education for Long Covid, ME and IACI is a vital area that needs to be improved. We hope this pod will be a resource to steer the narrative and conversation in a way that benefits those affected.
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