Abstract
Purpose :
Describing the procedures conducted during the peak of the COVID-19 pandemic in the department of ophthalmology at Henry Ford Hospital in Detroit, MI and understanding how the demographics of these patients compared to preceding years
Methods :
Electronic medical record data at Henry Ford Hospital in Detroit, MI was queried for all operative procedures. The procedures must have met three criteria: 1) scheduled from March 15th to May 19th, 2020, 2) A staff ophthalmologist as the primary surgeon, 3) The procedure status was “completed.” Parallel dates in the preceding three years 2017-2019 were queried to use as controls. Information obtained for each procedure included: date, procedure completed, age, race, sex, primary insurer, class of procedure (inpatient vs. outpatient). 2-tailed equal proportions tests and 2-tailed T tests were used to determine statistical significance of 2020 vs. preceding years 2017-2019.
Results :
On average, there was a 94% decline in the number of procedures in 2020 compared to the average of the three preceding years. Over 800 surgical procedures were postponed during the pandemic. Retina procedures were most prevalent in 2020. Significantly younger patients were seen in 2020. There were no significant difference in race distributions by year. There was a significantly higher proportion of males who underwent operative procedures in 2020. Significantly more procedures were done with inpatient status compared to outpatient compared to preceding years
Conclusions :
It is estimated that there is a 80-100% reduction in ophthalmologic surgical cases during COVID, which was consistent with our study of 94% decrease. The younger age group seen in 2020 was likely multifactorial, partially thought to be secondary to cancelling routine cataract and lens procedures on a largely older population skews the average age of procedures to the right, as well as a higher incidence of trauma requiring emergent procedural intervention in younger individuals such as for orbital floor fractures. Regarding a higher proportion of men, retinal procedures more commonly occur in men, and ambulatory procedures like cataract extraction which were cancelled during the pandemic are more commonly occur in women. We found no differences by race, which requires further study, and may possibly related to differences in baseline characteristics.
This is a 2021 ARVO Annual Meeting abstract.