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Impact of COVID-19 by Pandemic Wave among Patients with Gastroenterology Symptoms in the Emergency Departments at a Medical Center in Taiwan

The COVID-19 pandemic has affected emergency department (ED) usage. This study examines changes in the number of ED visits for gastrointestinal (GI) bleeding and nonemergency GI conditions, such as acute gastroenteritis (AGE) and constipation, before the pandemic and at the peak and slack periods of...

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Autores principales: Kuo, Tony, Liu, Chun-Hao, Chien, Cheng-Yu, Yeh, Chung-Cheng
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: MDPI 2022
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9223759/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/35742765
http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/ijerph19127516
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author Kuo, Tony
Liu, Chun-Hao
Chien, Cheng-Yu
Yeh, Chung-Cheng
author_facet Kuo, Tony
Liu, Chun-Hao
Chien, Cheng-Yu
Yeh, Chung-Cheng
author_sort Kuo, Tony
collection PubMed
description The COVID-19 pandemic has affected emergency department (ED) usage. This study examines changes in the number of ED visits for gastrointestinal (GI) bleeding and nonemergency GI conditions, such as acute gastroenteritis (AGE) and constipation, before the pandemic and at the peak and slack periods of the pandemic in Taiwan. This retrospective observational study was conducted at a referral medical center in northern Taiwan. We recorded the number of weekly ED visits for GI bleeding, AGE, and constipation from 2019 to 2021. We then compared the baseline period (calendar weeks 4–18 and 21–31, 2019) with two peak pandemic periods (period 1, calendar weeks 4–18, 2020; period 2, calendar weeks 21–31, 2021) and their corresponding slack periods. The decline in the number of ED visits during the two peak pandemic periods for GI bleeding (−18.4% and −30.2%) were not as substantial as for AGE (−64.1% and −76.7%) or for constipation (−44.4% and −63.6%), but GI bleeding cases were still significantly lower in number relative to the baseline. During the slack period, the number of ED visits for all three diagnoses rebounded but did not exceed the baseline. Our study revealed that there was a significant decline of GI complaint during the pandemic. This phenomenon was more prominent in nonemergency complaints (AGE and constipation) and less prominent in serious complaints (GI bleeding).
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spelling pubmed-92237592022-06-24 Impact of COVID-19 by Pandemic Wave among Patients with Gastroenterology Symptoms in the Emergency Departments at a Medical Center in Taiwan Kuo, Tony Liu, Chun-Hao Chien, Cheng-Yu Yeh, Chung-Cheng Int J Environ Res Public Health Article The COVID-19 pandemic has affected emergency department (ED) usage. This study examines changes in the number of ED visits for gastrointestinal (GI) bleeding and nonemergency GI conditions, such as acute gastroenteritis (AGE) and constipation, before the pandemic and at the peak and slack periods of the pandemic in Taiwan. This retrospective observational study was conducted at a referral medical center in northern Taiwan. We recorded the number of weekly ED visits for GI bleeding, AGE, and constipation from 2019 to 2021. We then compared the baseline period (calendar weeks 4–18 and 21–31, 2019) with two peak pandemic periods (period 1, calendar weeks 4–18, 2020; period 2, calendar weeks 21–31, 2021) and their corresponding slack periods. The decline in the number of ED visits during the two peak pandemic periods for GI bleeding (−18.4% and −30.2%) were not as substantial as for AGE (−64.1% and −76.7%) or for constipation (−44.4% and −63.6%), but GI bleeding cases were still significantly lower in number relative to the baseline. During the slack period, the number of ED visits for all three diagnoses rebounded but did not exceed the baseline. Our study revealed that there was a significant decline of GI complaint during the pandemic. This phenomenon was more prominent in nonemergency complaints (AGE and constipation) and less prominent in serious complaints (GI bleeding). MDPI 2022-06-20 /pmc/articles/PMC9223759/ /pubmed/35742765 http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/ijerph19127516 Text en © 2022 by the authors. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/Licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland. This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) license (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/).
spellingShingle Article
Kuo, Tony
Liu, Chun-Hao
Chien, Cheng-Yu
Yeh, Chung-Cheng
Impact of COVID-19 by Pandemic Wave among Patients with Gastroenterology Symptoms in the Emergency Departments at a Medical Center in Taiwan
title Impact of COVID-19 by Pandemic Wave among Patients with Gastroenterology Symptoms in the Emergency Departments at a Medical Center in Taiwan
title_full Impact of COVID-19 by Pandemic Wave among Patients with Gastroenterology Symptoms in the Emergency Departments at a Medical Center in Taiwan
title_fullStr Impact of COVID-19 by Pandemic Wave among Patients with Gastroenterology Symptoms in the Emergency Departments at a Medical Center in Taiwan
title_full_unstemmed Impact of COVID-19 by Pandemic Wave among Patients with Gastroenterology Symptoms in the Emergency Departments at a Medical Center in Taiwan
title_short Impact of COVID-19 by Pandemic Wave among Patients with Gastroenterology Symptoms in the Emergency Departments at a Medical Center in Taiwan
title_sort impact of covid-19 by pandemic wave among patients with gastroenterology symptoms in the emergency departments at a medical center in taiwan
topic Article
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9223759/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/35742765
http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/ijerph19127516
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