ABSTRACT
Background: Since the beginning of the spread of COVID-19, a lot of studies have been published describing the disease, its impact on other medical conditions, and the psychological consequences derived from the state of alarm and the confinement. However, no literature has been published regarding the impact of the pandemic situation on allergic patients. Objective: Assess and describe the appearance and development of an anxiety disorder in allergic patients during COVID-19 confinement measures due to the pandemic situation. Method: A descriptive observational study of patients aged 18-65 years attended by phone appointment at the Allergy department of Hospital Quironsalud Barcelona between March and May 2020. Those who had been diagnosed with any mental illness or psychological disorder, were excluded. All individuals gave their consent. The Goldberg scale was used for the diagnose of anxiety disorder. All analysis were performed using the Statistical software package SPSS version 20. A p value <0.05 was considered significant. Results: A total of 104 allergic patients were included (51.9% males, 50% females). Mean age was 39.1 years (20-66). The allergic history included 81.7% rhinitis, 51% asthma, 9.6% food allergy and 8.7% chronic urticaria. The 81.7% were under allergen specific immunotherapy treatment. During the observation period, 72.1% of the patients presented new symptoms: 46.2% attributed them to their allergy condition, 10.6% to COVID-19 and 15.4% to anxiety. Only one patient was truly diagnosed with COVID-19. According to Goldberg Scale, 49% presented anxiety disorder. This group developed more symptoms during confinement (88%) than those who were not diagnosed with anxiety (56%) (p < 0.001). The perception of allergic symptoms was similar in both groups (47% and 45% respectively, p = 0.92), while the perception of anxiety symptoms was different between groups (25.5% vs. 5.6%, p = 0.028). The presence of asthma was not correlated with higher diagnosed anxiety (p = 0.11). Conclusion: It is well known that allergic and respiratory infectious symptoms have similar characteristics and, therefore, it could be difficult for allergic patients to make the difference between Covid-19 infection and allergic reaction. To our knowledge, this is the first study to document a clear diagnosis of anxiety among allergic patients during the COVID-19 state of alarm. It is extremely important to take this condition into account to achieve a global good control of our patients.