Quantitative and qualitative analysis of the influence of confinement by COVID-19 in fracture patients entered in a traumatology service at a third level hospital()

INTRODUCTION: The COVID-19 pandemic has led to the confinement of approximately one third of the world population, causing a drastic change in the activities of daily life with many repercussions at the health, economic and social levels. OBJECTIVES: The objective of the present work is to present the epidemiological variations in the production of fractures in the period of mandatory confinement in our reference population. METHODS: Analytical retrospective comparative study of two groups of patients: Group A: patients admitted before the state of alarm that forced confinement in the period from January 13 to March 13 compared to Group B: patients admitted in the two months of confinement, until the de-escalation period began, March 13-May 13. Epidemiological variables including age, personal history, type of fracture, mechanism of injury, outpatient rate, and hospital stay were recorded. RESULTS: A total of 190 patients were included. 112 in the pre-confinement period and 78 in the confinement (30% decrease). The mean age (p = 0.007) and falls at home (p < 0.001) were higher in the confinement group. The postoperative (p = 0.006) and overall (p < 0.001) hospital stay were significantly less in the confinement group. No differences were found in the anatomical location of the lesion, sex, comorbidities, mechanism of injury, outpatient rate, or death. CONCLUSIONS: Based on the results of our study, the period of forced confinement due to the COVID-19 pandemic has produced a drastic decrease in the total number of fractures admitted to the traumatology service of a third level hospital. On the other hand, osteoporotic hip fractures have not varied in their incidence and a decrease in the average postoperative and overall stay has been observed.