Health-seeking and diagnosis delay and its associated factors: a case study on COVID-19 infections in Shaanxi Province, China

Abstract

Abstract This time-to-event study examines social factors associated with health-seeking and diagnosis of 165 COVID-19 cases in response to the pandemic spread in Shaanxi Province, China. In particular, we investigate the differential access to healthcare in terms of delayed time from symptom onset to first medical visit and subsequently to diagnosis by factors such as sex, age, travel history, and type of healthcare utilization. We show that it takes more time for patients older than 60 (against those under 30) to seek healthcare after developing symptoms (+ 2.5 days, $$p<0.01$$ p < 0.01 ), surveillance on people with living or travel history to Wuhan helps shorten the time to the first doctor visit (− 0.8 days) and diagnosis (− 2.2 days, $$p<0.01$$ p < 0.01 ). A delay cut is associated with the adoption of intermediary and large hospitals rather than community-based care as primary care choices (− 1.6 days, $$p<0.1$$ p < 0.1 and − 2.2 days, $$p<0.05$$ p < 0.05 ). One unit increase of healthcare workers per 1000 people saves patients 0.5 days ( $$p<0.1$$ p < 0.1 ) for diagnosis from the first doctor visit and 0.6 days ( $$p<0.05$$ p < 0.05 ) in total. Our analysis of factors associated with the time delay for diagnosis may provide a better understanding of the health-seeking behaviors of patients and the diagnosis capacity of healthcare providers during the COVID-19 pandemic.