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Psychiatric admission decrease during COVID-19 lockdown in older patients

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  19 July 2023

O. Martin-Santiago ,
M. C. Vallecillo-Adame ,
T. Jimenez-Aparicio  and
A. Perez-Escudero
O. Martin-Santiago*
Affiliation:
1Department of Psychiatry, Hospital Clínico Universitario de Valladolid, Valladolid
M. C. Vallecillo-Adame
Affiliation:
1Department of Psychiatry, Hospital Clínico Universitario de Valladolid, Valladolid
T. Jimenez-Aparicio
Affiliation:
1Department of Psychiatry, Hospital Clínico Universitario de Valladolid, Valladolid
A. Perez-Escudero
Affiliation:
2Complejo asistencial de Zamora, Zamora, Spain
*
*Corresponding author.

Abstract

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Introduction

Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) modify voluntary admission rates to psychiatric wards in the early phases following pandemic onset. Older patients have higher COVID-19 distress scores because elderly people are at risk for COVID-19 infection.

Objectives

The present investigation aimed at admission rates of elderly patients to a General Hospital Psychiatric Ward during the lockdown due to the COVID-19, compared to similar periods of 2018 and 2019.

Methods

Anonymized data on psychiatric admissions (n=55) from one general hospital psychiatric ward have been obtained and analysed. We compared admission characteristics between April and June of 2018 and 2019 with the same period of 2020 (lockdown).

Results

During the COVID-19 lockdown, a significant reduction in psychiatric hospitalizations of older patients (aged >65 years) was observed in the lockdown (69.2%; χ2=4.823,df=1,p=0.028) in contrast with young patients (26.7% reduction). There was a reduction of 14% in admission due to suicidal behaviour (IRR = 0.57; 95% CI: 0.11-2.75; p=0.48), 25% in depression (IRR = 0.28; 95% CI: 0.64-1.25; p=0.09) and 50% in psychotic disorders (IRR = 0.33; 95% CI: 0.07-1.48; p=0.15). There was none admission by dementia during the lockdown.

Conclusions

Changes in the number of psychiatric admissions, particularly for older patients, were observed during the COVID-19 lockdown. During this period, their fear levels could modify their psychiatric admission rates. We suggest that the decrease of psychiatric admissions in the elderly was due to fear of contagion in hospitals.

Disclosure of Interest

None Declared

Type
Abstract
Information
European Psychiatry , Volume 66 , Special Issue S1: Abstracts of the 31st European Congress of Psychiatry , March 2023 , pp. S233 - S234
Creative Commons
Creative Common License - CCCreative Common License - BY
This is an Open Access article, distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution licence (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits unrestricted re-use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.
Copyright
© The Author(s), 2023. Published by Cambridge University Press on behalf of the European Psychiatric Association
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