investigate relationship of clustering to an outcome of interest, e.g. are members of a particular cluster more likely to experience that outcome compared with members of other clusters?
What outcome? outcomes such as AKI or ECMO make sense for patients hospitalized with acute covid, but only the most severe long covid patients would wind up back in the hospital with these complications. Some might end up on dialysis if they experienced AKI while hospitalized, but this is probably a small proportion of long covid patients?
investigate relationship of clustering to an outcome of interest, e.g. are members of a particular cluster more likely to experience that outcome compared with members of other clusters? What outcome? outcomes such as AKI or ECMO make sense for patients hospitalized with acute covid, but only the most severe long covid patients would wind up back in the hospital with these complications. Some might end up on dialysis if they experienced AKI while hospitalized, but this is probably a small proportion of long covid patients?