Positives

• COVID-19 patients on a guided imagery intervention commonly report significant reductions in state and trait anxiety, pain quality and intensity, and improvements in heart rate, systolic blood pressure, and oxygen saturation compared with controls PMC.
• Long COVID care guides for nurses now recommend pairing visualization with energy-conservation and breathing techniques as a tool patients can use to soften pain flares and quiet anxiety between appointments American Nurse.

Negatives

• Patients on mindfulness and visualization-style interventions for Long COVID commonly see improved symptom self-reports while the effect on underlying biological mechanisms remains unclear, so some patients try it for weeks and see nothing measurable change PMC.
• Meaningful effects in the Long COVID space tend to require interventions of at least eight weeks of consistent practice, which means patients who try a few sessions and stop often report no benefit Dovepress.

Hurdles & Side Effects

• Patients experiencing post-COVID vision problems, such as “blurred vision” and “light sensitivity,” may find it challenging to determine if visualization will aid their recovery Reddit.