• Internal medicine · Jun 2024

    Association between the decrease in medical visit frequency and chronic disease worsening in the early stages of COVID-19-A longitudinal study.

    • Takeshi Takakubo, Yuko Odagiri, Masaki Machida, Tomoko Takamiya, Noritoshi Fukushima, Hiroyuki Kikuchi, Toshio Hayashi, Shiho Amagasa, and Shigeru Inoue.
    • Department of Preventive Medicine and Public Health, Tokyo Medical University, Japan.
    • Intern. Med. 2024 Jun 15; 63 (12): 168916961689-1696.

    AbstractObjective This longitudinal study aimed to clarify the changes in the medical treatment behavior of Japanese patients with chronic diseases during the early phase of the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic and examine the factors associated with disease worsening. Methods Subjects with chronic diseases were selected from a panel survey that started at the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic consists of 2,400 participants recruited via the Internet. Medical treatment behaviors (decrease in medical visit frequency, inability to take regular medications, and utilization of telephone/online medical care), psychological distress, and sociodemographic factors were evaluated at baseline (May 2020) and at the follow-up survey (February 2021). A worsening of chronic diseases was defined as those who answered "yes" to the question, "Has-the-condition-of-the-chronic-disease-worsened?". The factors related to the worsening of chronic diseases at follow-up were examined. Results A total of 514 participants (mean age 61.6±12.9 years) were analyzed. The percentage of participants who reported decreasing medical visit frequency was 34% at the baseline and 16.5% at follow-up, and those who reported a worsening of chronic diseases was 5.1% and 5.1%, respectively. A worsening of chronic diseases at follow-up was significantly associated with a younger age, a decreased frequency of medical visits, unemployment, a history of smoking, and psychological distress. Conclusions A decreased frequency of medical visits was observed among one-third of the participants with chronic disease in the early stage of the pandemic, and it reduced by half at follow-up. In the early stages of an emerging infectious disease pandemic, decreased regular hospital/clinic visits can lead to a worsening of chronic diseases. Those who had psychological distress, unemployment, and a history of smoking were vulnerable to a worsening chronic disease.

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