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A Rapid Multi-Centre Service Evaluation of Presentations to Children's Emergency Departments During the COVID-19 Pandemic
12 Pages Posted: 12 Aug 2020
More...Abstract
Background: The COVID-19 Pandemic has resulted in the potential unintended consequence of parents being reluctant to bring their children to hospital for acute and emergency care. While there is evidence of this occurring via case series a prospective evaluation has not be performed.
Methods: Seven Emergency Departments (EDs) seeing children less than 16 years old collected data prospectively for two weeks on all presenting patients. Information was collected on age, the presence of red flag symptoms (as defined by the Royal College of Paediatrics and Child Health), presence of, and reasons for, any delay in attending.
Findings: There were 1460 entries via the portal with 1349 usable entries. The majority of patients, 1262 (93.5%), were felt not to have had a delay in their presentation and of the 51 (3.8%) patients with a potential concern over delay six were admitted. Red flag symptoms were reported in 81 patients; two of these were felt to be delayed presentations but neither were admitted.
Interpretation: In a large prospective cohort of children presenting to a representative group of Children’s Emergency Departments the rate of clinician reported delay in presentation was low. While concerns regarding delayed presentations in the UK due to COVID-19 are valid, the impact may be less than originally thought.
Funding Statement: This project received no funding.
Declaration of Interests: None of the authors has anything to declare.
Ethics Approval Statement: Data collection was approved under the COPI notice issued on the 20th March, 2020. The website was approved by NHSX and no identifiable information were recorded other than date of presentation and age. The project was endorsed by the RCPCH as a national service evaluation and appropriate data protection impact assessments took place. Authors did not receive formal IRB approval.
Keywords: SAR-CoV-2; Children's Emergency Care; Delayed Presentations, Health Policy
Suggested Citation: Suggested Citation