Anales de pediatria
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Anales de pediatria · Apr 2021
Observational Study[Impact of COVID-19 on the presentation and course of acute appendicitis in paediatrics].
Acute appendicitis (AA) is the most frequent urgent surgical pathology in pediatrics. The COVID-19 pandemic has led to a decrease in emergency department (ED) visits, which can lead to a delay in health care and an increase in the severity of the pathologies. The objective is to analyze the rate of complicated AA during the pandemic, compared to the same period of the previous year. ⋯ 90 patients were included (41 in non-pandemic and 49 in pandemic). No difference was found between the two periods in the time from the clinic onset until the visit to the ED (37h vs 38h, p=0.881), but there was a difference in the time from arrival at the ED until the surgery (7:00h vs 10:30h, p=0.004). The difference was accentuated when comparing the month of March with April-May 2020 (6h vs 12h; p=0.001). No significant differences were observed in the rate of complicated AA in intraoperative diagnosis (35% vs 33%; p=0.870) or anatomopathology (35% vs 48%; p=0.222), nor in the number of postoperative complications, length of hospitalization and readmissions. An increase in the anatomopathological diagnosis of AA with periapendicitis was observed (47% vs 81%; p=0.001) CONCLUSION: During the pandemic, a delay from arrival at the ED until the surgery was observed in children diagnosed with AA. This delay resulted in an increase in the diagnosis of histologically evolved AA, but without an increase in the clinical complications of the disease.