Did admissions caused by respiratory infections and asthma decrease
during the COVID-19 pandemic?
Abstract
Background: COVID-19 outbreak lead to nationwide lockdown on the March
16th, 2020 in Turkey. We aimed to quantitively determine the change in
frequency of upper and lower respiratory tract infections and asthma in
pediatric population associated with COVID-19. Methods: The electronic
medical record data of pediatric population admitted to the emergency
department (ED), outpatient and inpatient clinics and pediatric
intensive care unit (PICU) were analyzed with the diagnosis of
Influenza, upper and lower respiratory tract infections (URTI, LRTI)
acute bronchiolitis and asthma. The data of the first year of the
pandemic was compared with the previous year. Results: In total 112496
admissions were made between April 1, 2019 and March 31, 2021 in our
hospital. A decline was observed in ED admissions (-73%) and outpatient
clinic (-70%) visits, hospitalizations (-41.5%) and PICU admissions
(-42%). The admissions with the diagnosis of Influenza and URTI had a
decline from 4.26% to 0.37% (p=0.0001), and from 81.54% to 75.62%
(p=0.0001), respectively. An increase was observed in the LRTI, acute
bronchiolitis and asthma (from 8.22% to 10.01% (p=0.0001), from 2.76%
to 3.07% (p=0.027) and from 5.96% to 14% (p=0.0001), respectively).
Conclusions: A dramatic decrease was observed in the number of
admissions to ED and inpatient clinics and outpatient clinic visits and
PICU admissions, and, when the rates of admissions were compared, the
general rate of admissions to ED showed a decrease while inpatient,
outpatient clinics and PICU admissions demonstrated an increase during
the pandemic.