Essential inpatient otolaryngology: what COVID-19 has revealed.
Eur Arch Otorhinolaryngol
; 279(2): 1053-1062, 2022 Feb.
Article
in English
| MEDLINE | ID: covidwho-1303318
ABSTRACT
PURPOSE:
To identify areas of critical otolaryngology contributions to inpatient care resistant to disruption by the COVID-19 pandemic.METHODS:
Medical records of 614 otolaryngology consults seen between January and June of 2019 and 602 seen between January and June of 2020 were reviewed. Extracted data included patient demographics, SARS-CoV-2 status, medical comorbidities, consult location, consult category, reason for consult, procedures performed, and overall outcome. Prevalence of data items was compared using t tests and Chi-squared tests.RESULTS:
The number of monthly consults to the otolaryngology service remained approximately stable after the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic. However, there was a substantial increase in ICU consults and a decrease in ER and floor consults. The proportion of otology, rhinology, and head and neck consults decreased while that of airway consults-most of which were tracheostomy-related-greatly increased. While the top ten reasons for consult remained essentially the same, they dramatically increased as a percentage of consults during COVID-19 (55-92%), whereas there was a dramatic decrease in the proportion of less frequent consults.CONCLUSION:
The changes in otolaryngology consultation patterns seen after the onset of the pandemic are multifactorial, but may be attributed to novel pathologies, attitudes, and policies. Nonetheless, these patterns reveal that a set of core otolaryngologic issues, including acute airway issues, head and neck lesions, severe sinusitis and epistaxis, are essential and need to be addressed in the inpatient setting, whereas the significant drop in other consults suggests that they may be appropriately managed on an outpatient basis.Keywords
Full text:
Available
Collection:
International databases
Database:
MEDLINE
Main subject:
Otolaryngology
/
COVID-19
Type of study:
Observational study
/
Prognostic study
Limits:
Humans
Language:
English
Journal:
Eur Arch Otorhinolaryngol
Journal subject:
Otolaryngology
Year:
2022
Document Type:
Article
Affiliation country:
S00405-021-06963-7
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