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UCL Great Ormond Street Institute of Child Health

Great Ormond Street Institute of Child Health

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About The Study

A Brief Summary of CLoCk

The CLoCk study of Long Covid in children and young people (CYP) is funded by NIHR and ended data collection in May 2023. It had three aims.

1) To describe what happens to children and young people in the months after they have COVID-19

2) To agree what is meant by ‘Long COVID’ or ‘Post COVID-19 Condition’ in CYP to help researchers compare findings

3) To help understand how many CYP in England are likely have Long COVID.

The CLoCk study has now ended.

What is CLoCk?

What did CLoCk Do?

The CLoCk research study used information volunteered by 30,000 11-17 year olds across England to:

  1. Describe which problems children and young people with Long COVID most commonly experienced
  2. Come up with a definition of Long COVID for children and young people
  3. Research how common it is in children and young people
  4. Find out how long it lasts in children and young people
  5. Identify risk factors for Long COVID in children and young people

A Summary of Findings

Key findings and contributions have included:

  1. The most common problems were persisting tiredness, trouble sleeping, shortness of breath and headache
  2. A definition of Long COVID for children and young people which has also helped the World Health Organisation develop a global definition
  3. Although ¼ of our participating children and young people met this definition 3 months after testing positive for the SARS-CoV-2 virus which causes COVID, only about ¼ of those children and young people still met this definition 24-months after testing. That is, ¾ of those who met the Long COVID definition 3 months after infection had got better by 2 years after the original infection. Only 7% of our original participants met the definition at all follow-up time points up to 24-months.
  4. We found an increased chance of Long COVID persisting for 24 months in children and young people with a past history of asthma, allergy problems, learning difficulties at school, those with a family history of ongoing COVID-19 problems, those who were older at infection and in girls.

Patient Public Involvement (PPI)

PPI involvement is at the heart of our work and led by Emma Dalrymple. We had a diverse group of Children and Young People that met regularly to help inform the project. PPI group contributions including checking the long covid definition, feeding back on presentations and helping to designing dissemination videos and the website.