Table 2.

Participant demographics by trajectory of perceived social support following critical illness

Attribute	Stable*	Improving*	Declining*	Volatile*
	(N = 42)	(N = 23)	(N = 24)	(N = 23)
Age, years, median (IQR)	50 (42–60)	55 (48–62)	53 (50–65)	64 (49–67)
Female, n (%)	27 (64%)	12 (52%)	9 (38%)	14 (61%)
Race, n (%)
Black	10 (24%)	5 (22%)	10 (42%)	7 (30%)
Non-Hispanic White	25 (60%)	16 (70%)	13 (54%)	14 (61%)
Other/multiple	7 (17%)	2 (9%)	1 (4%)	2 (9%)
Resided at home before admission, n (%)	41 (98%)	23 (100%)	23 (96%)	23 (100%)
Tested positive for COVID-19 during admission, n (%)	10 (24%)	5 (22%)	4 (17%)	4 (17%)
Multidimensional Scale Perceived Social Support, median (IQR)	73 (68–79)	72 (57–79)	84 (71–84)	72 (55–82)
Significant other	26 (24–28)	25 (13–28)	28 (23–28)	26 (18–28)
Family	26 (24–28)	25 (24–27)	28 (28–28)	25 (24–28)
Friends	24 (22–26)	24 (23–26)	28 (27–28)	24 (19–28)

Definition of abbreviations: COVID-19 = coronavirus disease; IQR = interquartile range; MSPSS = Multidimensional Scale of Perceived Social Support.

^*Participants’ total MSPSS scores at 3- and 6-month assessments were compared to their score at the previous assessment, with 3-month scores compared to hospital discharge. Scores were only treated as higher or lower than the previous assessment if they changed by >1 standard deviation from the patient’s score at the previous assessment. This created 9 groups of survivors, all but one of which contained ⩽15 people. For example, there were 8 people whose total MSPSS score was higher at the 3-month assessment, and effectively the same at the 6-month assessment, termed: “higher-same”. These groups were then categorized as follows: Stable = same–same (N = 42); Improving = same–higher (15) + higher–same (8) +  higher–higher (0); Declining = same–lower (8) + lower–same (15) + lower–lower (1); Volatile = higher–lower (15) + lower–higher (8).