The Trends in Volume of Trauma-Related Visits to Emergency Department During the COVID-19 Pandemic

Abstract

Aim: After the first case in Wuhan, China in late 2019, COVID-19 quickly spread and affected the whole world. While it had been recommended to postpone healthcare services for non-emergency cases, several studies showed that many emergency cases were decreased as well. In this study, we aimed to investigate whether the trends in visits to the emergency department (ED) were altered during the COVID period. Materials: We evaluated the ED visits between July 1, 2019 and June 30, 2020 due to transport injuries, falls, interpersonal violence and self-harm using International Classification of Diseases, 10th revision codes. Pre-COVID period was defined as July 2019-Mar 2020 and COVID period was defined as April-June 2020. To show whether there was a significant change between pre-COVID and COVID periods (monthly), we used piecewise regression analyses. Results: In total, there were 14,958 ED visits due to transport injuries, falls, interpersonal violence and self-harm during the study period. Piecewise regression analysis revealed that ED visits for transport injury (p=0.028), falls (p=0.006) and interpersonal violence (p=0.007) significantly decreased, whereas, there was a significant increase in visits for self-harm (p

Keywords

• covid-19
• wounds and injuries
• accidental falls
• violence
• self-injurious behavior
• traffic accidents
• covid-19
• düşme
• darp
• özkıyım
• trafik kazası