Sociodemographic Differences in Physician-Based Mental Health and Virtual Care Utilization and Uptake of Virtual Care Among Children and Adolescents During the COVID-19 Pandemic in Ontario, Canada: A Population-Based Study.

OBJECTIVE: We sought to evaluate the relationship between social determinants of health and physician-based mental healthcare utilization and virtual care use among children and adolescents in Ontario, Canada, during the COVID-19 pandemic. METHODS: This population-based repeated cross-sectional study of children and adolescents (3-17 years; N = 2.5 million) used linked health and demographic administrative data in Ontario, Canada (2017-2021). Multivariable Poisson regressions with generalized estimating equations compared rates of outpatient physician-based mental healthcare use during the first year of the COVID-19 pandemic with expected rates based on pre-COVID patterns. Analyses were conducted by socioeconomic status (material deprivation quintiles of the Ontario Marginalization index), urban/rural region of residence, and immigration status. RESULTS: Overall, pediatric physician-based mental healthcare visits were 5% lower than expected (rate ratio [RR] = 0.95, 95% confidence interval [CI], 0.92 to 0.98) among those living in the most deprived areas in the first year of the pandemic, compared with the least deprived with 4% higher than expected rates (RR = 1.04, 95% CI, 1.02 to 1.06). There were no differences in overall observed and expected visit rates by region of residence. Immigrants had 14% to 26% higher visit rates compared with expected from July 2020 to February 2021, whereas refugees had similarly observed and expected rates. Virtual care use was approximately 65% among refugees, compared with 70% for all strata. CONCLUSION: During the first year of the pandemic, pediatric physician-based mental healthcare utilization was higher among immigrants and lower than expected among those with lower socioeconomic status. Refugees had the lowest use of virtual care. Further work is needed to understand whether these differences reflect issues in access to care or the need to help inform ongoing pandemic recovery planning.

Characterizing the Impact of Procedure Funding on the Covid-19 Generated Procedure Gap in Ontario: A Population-Based Analysis.

BACKGROUND: Surgical procedures in Canada were historically funded through global hospital budgets. Activity-based funding models were developed to improve access, equity, timeliness and value of care for priority areas. COVID-19 upended health priorities and resulted in unprecedented disruptions to surgical care which created a significant procedure gap. We hypothesized that activity-based funding models influenced the magnitude and trajectory of this procedure gap. METHODS: Population-based analysis of procedure rates comparing pandemic (March 1, 2020 to December 31, 2021) to a pre-pandemic baseline (January 1, 2017 to February 29, 2020) in Ontario, Canada. Poisson generalized estimating equation models were used to predict expected rates in the pandemic based on the pre-pandemic baseline. Analyses were stratified by procedure type (out-patient, in-patient), body region, and funding category (activity-based funding programs vs. global budget). RESULTS: 281,328 fewer scheduled procedures were performed during the COVID-19 period compared to the pre-pandemic baseline (Rate Ratio 0.78; 95%CI 0.77-0.80). In-patient procedures saw a larger reduction (24.8%) in volume compared to out-patient procedures (20.5%). An increase in the proportion of procedures funded through activity-based programs was seen during the pandemic (52%) relative to the pre-pandemic baseline (50%). Body systems funded predominantly through global hospital budgets (e.g. gynecology, otologic surgery) saw the least months at or above baseline volumes whereas those with multiple activity-based funding options (e.g. musculoskeletal, abdominal) saw the most months at or above baseline volumes. CONCLUSIONS: Those needing procedures funded though global hospital budgets may have been disproportionately disadvantaged by pandemic-related health care disruptions.

Trends in all-cause mortality and inpatient and outpatient visits for ambulatory care sensitive conditions during the first year of the COVID-19 pandemic: A population-based study.

BACKGROUND: The impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on the management of ambulatory care sensitive conditions (ACSCs) remains unknown. OBJECTIVES: To compare observed and expected (projected based on previous years) trends in all-cause mortality and healthcare use for ACSCs in the first year of the pandemic (March 2020 to March 2021). DESIGN, SETTING AND PARTICIPANTS: We conducted a population-based study using provincial health administrative data on general adul population (Ontario, Canada). OUTCOMES AND MEASURES: Monthly all-cause mortality, and hospitalizations, emergency department (ED) and outpatient visit rates (per 100,000 people at-risk) for seven combined ACSCs (asthma, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, angina, congestive heart failure, hypertension, diabetes, and epilepsy) during the first year were compared with similar periods in previous years (2016-2019) by fitting monthly time series autoregressive integrated moving-average models. RESULTS: Compared to previous years, all-cause mortality rates increased at the beginning of the pandemic (observed rate in March to May 2020 of 79.98 vs. projected of 71.24 [66.35-76.50]) and then returned to expected in June 2020-except among immigrants and people with mental health conditions where they remained elevated. Hospitalization and ED visit rates for ACSCs remained lower than projected throughout the first year: observed hospitalization rate of 37.29 versus projected of 52.07 (47.84-56.68); observed ED visit rate of 92.55 versus projected of 134.72 (124.89-145.33). ACSC outpatient visit rates decreased initially (observed rate of 4299.57 vs. projected of 5060.23 [4712.64-5433.46]) and then returned to expected in June 2020.

Non-negative matrix factorization temporal topic models and clinical text data identify COVID-19 pandemic effects on primary healthcare and community health in Toronto, Canada.

OBJECTIVE: To demonstrate how non-negative matrix factorization can be used to learn a temporal topic model over a large collection of primary care clinical notes, characterizing diverse COVID-19 pandemic effects on the physical/mental/social health of residents of Toronto, Canada. MATERIALS AND METHODS: The study employs a retrospective open cohort design, consisting of 382,666 primary care progress notes from 44,828 patients, 54 physicians, and 12 clinics collected 01/01/2017 through 31/12/2020. Non-negative matrix factorization uncovers a meaningful latent topical structure permeating the corpus of primary care notes. The learned latent topical basis is transformed into a multivariate time series data structure. Time series methods and plots showcase the evolution/dynamics of learned topics over the study period and allow the identification of COVID-19 pandemic effects. We perform several post-hoc checks of model robustness to increase trust that descriptive/unsupervised inferences are stable over hyper-parameter configurations and/or data perturbations. RESULTS: Temporal topic modelling uncovers a myriad of pandemic-related effects from the expressive clinical text data. In terms of direct effects on patient-health, topics encoding respiratory disease symptoms display altered dynamics during the pandemic year. Further, the pandemic was associated with a multitude of indirect patient-level effects on topical domains representing mental health, sleep, social and familial dynamics, measurement of vitals/labs, uptake of prevention/screening maneuvers, and referrals to medical specialists. Finally, topic models capture changes in primary care practice patterns resulting from the pandemic, including changes in EMR documentation strategies and the uptake of telemedicine. CONCLUSION: Temporal topic modelling applied to a large corpus of rich primary care clinical text data, can identify a meaningful topical/thematic summarization which can provide policymakers and public health stakeholders a passive, cost-effective, technology for understanding holistic impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic on the primary healthcare system and community/public-health.

Utilization of Physician-Based Mental Health Care Services Among Children and Adolescents Before and During the COVID-19 Pandemic in Ontario, Canada.

IMPORTANCE: Public health measures to reduce the spread of COVID-19 have heightened distress among children and adolescents and contributed to a shift in delivery of mental health care services. OBJECTIVES: To measure and compare physician-based outpatient mental health care utilization before and during the COVID-19 pandemic and quantify the extent of uptake of virtual care delivery. DESIGN, SETTING, AND PARTICIPANTS: Population-based repeated cross-sectional study using linked health and administrative databases in Ontario, Canada. All individuals aged 3 to 17 years residing in Ontario from January 1, 2017, to February 28, 2021. EXPOSURES: Pre-COVID-19 period from January 1, 2017, to February 29, 2020, and post-COVID-19 onset from March 1, 2020, to February 28, 2021. MAIN OUTCOMES AND MEASURES: Physician-based outpatient weekly visit rates per 1000 population for mental health diagnoses overall and stratified by age group, sex, and mental health diagnostic grouping and proportion of virtual visits. Poisson generalized estimating equations were used to model 3-year pre-COVID-19 trends and forecast expected trends post-COVID-19 onset and estimate the change in visit rates before and after the onset of COVID-19. The weekly proportions of virtual visits were calculated. RESULTS: In a population of almost 2.5 million children and adolescents (48.7% female; mean [SD] age, 10.1 [4.3] years), the weekly rate of mental health outpatient visits was 6.9 per 1000 population. Following the pandemic onset, visit rates declined rapidly to below expected (adjusted relative rate [aRR], 0.81; 95% CI, 0.79-0.82) in April 2020 followed by a growth to above expected (aRR, 1.07; 95% CI, 1.04-1.09) by July 2020 and sustained at 10% to 15% above expected as of February 2021. Adolescent female individuals had the greatest increase in visit rates relative to expected by the end of the study (aRR, 1.26; 95% CI, 1.25-1.28). Virtual care accounted for 5.0 visits per 1000 population (72.5%) of mental health visits over the study period, with a peak of 5.3 visits per 1000 population (90.1%) (April 2020) and leveling off to approximately 70% in the latter months. CONCLUSIONS AND RELEVANCE: Physician-based outpatient mental health care in Ontario increased during the pandemic, accompanied by a large, rapid shift to virtual care. There was a disproportionate increase in use of mental health care services among adolescent female individuals. System-level planning to address the increasing capacity needs and to monitor quality of care with such large shifts is warranted.

Pediatric primary care in Ontario and Manitoba after the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic: a population-based study.

BACKGROUND: There were large disruptions to health care services after the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic. We sought to describe the extent to which pandemic-related changes in service delivery and access affected use of primary care for children overall and by equity strata in the 9 months after pandemic onset in Manitoba and Ontario. METHODS: We performed a population-based study of children aged 17 years or less with provincial health insurance in Ontario or Manitoba before and during the COVID-19 pandemic (Jan. 1, 2017-Nov. 28, 2020). We calculated the weekly rates of in-person and virtual primary care well-child and sick visits, overall and by age group, neighbourhood material deprivation level, rurality and immigrant status, and assessed changes in visit rates after COVID-19 restrictions were imposed compared to expected baseline rates calculated for the 3 years before pandemic onset. RESULTS: Among almost 3 million children in Ontario and more than 300 000 children in Manitoba, primary care visit rates declined to 0.80 (95% confidence interval [CI] 0.77-0.82) of expected in Ontario and 0.82 (95% CI 0.79-0.84) of expected in Manitoba in the 9 months after the onset of the pandemic. Virtual visits accounted for 53% and 29% of visits in Ontario and Manitoba, respectively. The largest monthly decreases in visits occurred in April 2020. Although visit rates increased slowly after April 2020, they had not returned to prerestriction levels by November 2020 in either province. Children aged more than 1 year to 12 years experienced the greatest decrease in visits, especially for well-child care. Compared to prepandemic levels, visit rates were lowest among rural Manitobans, urban Ontarians and Ontarians in low-income neighbourhoods. INTERPRETATION: During the study period, the pandemic contributed to rapid, immediate and inequitable decreases in primary care use, with some recovery and a substantial shift to virtual care. Postpandemic planning must consider the need for catch-up visits, and the long-term impacts warrant further study.

Acute Care Visits for Eating Disorders Among Children and Adolescents After the Onset of the COVID-19 Pandemic.

PURPOSE: Anecdotal reports suggest a significant increase in acute presentations of eating disorders among children and adolescents. Our objective was to compare the rates of emergency department visits and hospitalizations for pediatric eating disorders before and during the first 10 months of the COVID-19 pandemic. METHODS: Using linked health administrative databases, we conducted a population-based repeated cross-sectional study of emergency department visits and hospitalizations for eating disorders among all children and adolescents aged 3-17 years, residing in Ontario, Canada. We defined the pre-COVID period from January 1, 2017, to February 29, 2020, and the post-COVID period from March 1, 2020, to December 26, 2020. Poisson generalized estimating equations were used to model 3-year pre-COVID trends to predict expected post-COVID trends and estimate the relative change from expected rates. RESULTS: In our population of almost 2.5 million children and adolescents, acute care visits for eating disorders increased immediately after the onset of the pandemic, reaching a 4-week peak annualized rate of 34.6 (emergency department visits) and 43.2 per 100,000 population (hospitalizations) in October 2020. Overall, we observed a 66% (adjusted relative rate: 1.66, 95% confidence interval: 1.41-1.96) and 37% (adjusted relative rate: 1.37, 95% confidence interval: 1.25-1.50) increase in risk for emergency department visit and hospitalization, respectively. CONCLUSIONS: Acute care visits for pediatric eating disorders increased significantly in Ontario after the onset of COVID-19 pandemic and remained well above expected levels during the first 10 months of the pandemic. Further research is needed to understand the social and neurobiological mechanisms underlying the observed changes in health system utilization.