Authors (including presenting author) :
Mo KC(1),Ng MW(1),Tam KC(1),Poon KH(1),Vong YP(1),Tsang HC(1),To YL(1), Leung HY(2),Sun TF(3)
Affiliation :
(1)Physiotherapy department, North District Hospital,(2)Community Outreach Services Team,North District Hospital,(3)Hospital Chief Executive Office,North District Hospital
Introduction :
Facing coronavirus disease 2019(COVID-19) pandemic, many public hospital services were adjusted. With relevant policies on crowd control in hospitals for reducing cross infection risks, community service plays an important role in helping people stay healthy in community, just as the mission of Hospital Authority(HA).
Community Physiotherapy(CPT) serves for home exercise and walking aids prescription, community fall risks assessment and management, care-giver education and chest physiotherapy. Since HA has activated the Emergency Response Level, no visitors were allowed, thus, some care-giver education sessions were referred to CPT. Also, with the suspension of community rehabilitation service provided by non-government organizations(NGOs), demands on follow-up visit by CPT were increased.
Objectives :
To evaluate the demand changes under COVID-19 pandemic on NDH CPT service.
Methodology :
With retrospective case-control design, the working statistics of NDH CPT were reviewed. The period between February and November 2020 was included as affected by COVID-19 while February to November 2019 was included as normal period.
Result & Outcome :
[Data in (means ± standard deviation in 2020 vs 2019)]
In the period affected by COVID-19, total CPT visit increased for 30.1%(1645 vs 1264). The Chi-square test(p< 0.001) shows that there were statistically significantly higher percentage of home cases(34.5% vs 17.7%) and lower percentage of OAH cases(65.5% vs 82.3%), when compared to 2019.
In Home group, Independent t-tests show that there were statistically significantly higher mean in monthly new cases count(24.8±6.9 vs 13.3±3.3,p< 0.001) and subsequence visits(38.4±11.4 vs 13.0±6.3,p< 0.001). 72.1%(165/229) new cases were post hospital discharge patients. The major post-discharged patient groups were neurological(29.3%) and decondition cases(20.1%). Following up on fall prevention and home exercise accounted for 61.0% referral. 72.0%(118/165) of cases were able to stay in community for more than 28 days after discharge.
In OAH group, Independent t-tests show that there was statistically significantly higher mean in monthly subsequence visits(92.6±13.5 vs 89.3±17.1,p=0.000) but similar new cases count(19.2±5.1 vs 18.7±4.5,p=0.405). 58.0%(101/174) were referred for chest conditions maintenance in bedridden elder(mean age 82.8). 63.4%(64/101) were able to stay in community for more than 28 days since CPT started.
To conclude, demands on CPT service in NDH were raised in COVID-19 pandemic period. New referrals for home cases and needs on follow-up visits were increased explicitly.
