COVID-19 in the intravitreal injection (IVI) procedure at a Spanish urban tertiary hospital

Author: Jonathan Jesús Cancelliere Fernández (Spain)

Co-authors: J Jacobo Gonzalez-Guijarro, María Muxima Patricia Acebes García, F Javier Moreno-Alemán Sánchez

Purpose

To describe the percentage of COVID-19 patients treated with the IVI procedure at the onset of the pandemic.

Setting/Venue

Urban tertiary hospital

Methods

This transversal, observational and retrospective study included patients treated with IVI, subdivided into 3 groups as follows. Group A: from February 20 to March 15, 2020, a period prior to confinement and the first preventive measures against viral transmission. Group B: from March 16 to May 3, after the commencement of confinement measures, and group C: from May 4 to June 19, after confinement. The following data were gathered and analysed: age, sex, prescription, drug and procedure uni- or bilaterality, visual acuity, percentage of single eyes, date of COVID-19 diagnosis, incidence among the population in the Hospital’s area of influence and number of COVID-19 patients admitted daily.

Results

1049 patients were treated, 564 (53.7%) of these on two or more occasions, with lower mean age in group B: 77.53 years (p 0.00001). The percentage of patients diagnosed with COVID-19 was 1.51% (8/529) in group A, 0.21% (1/469) in group B and 0% in group C (0/926) (p=0.0001). The highest incidence peak x105 inhabitants and the mean daily admission rate, for the periods corresponding to the three groups, were 93.70 / 7.70 (SD 7.32), 418.72 / 27.83 (SD 24.68) and 24.58 / 2.28 (SD 1.97), respectively.

Conlusions

The favourable trend in the percentage of COVID-19 among patients treated with IVI, after the implementation of preventive measures against viral transmission, may assist in adequately planning such procedures in the future.

Financial Disclosure

none of the authors have any financial or conflicting interests to disclose.

Comments

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