Drastic decrease in the levels of medical consultation at the ER and hospitalization due to cardiovascular pathology in the COVID-19 period

The lowest mortality in cardiovascular pathology was achieved with the use of new diagnostic and therapeutic tools The actual scenario due to COVID-19, altered the number of people going to medical centers Objective: To evaluate the impact of the change in the number of medical consultations by rotation and the number of hospitalizations in a cardiology center Materials and method: All medical consultations and hospitalizations from January 1, 2020 to April 20, 2020 were analyzed The changes in the number of medical consultations/day and hospitalizations/day in the period before to the implementation of the mandatory quarantine (BQ) (January 1, 2020 to March 19, 2020) versus the quarantine period (QP) (March 20, 2020 to April 20, 2020) were analyzed The results are expressed in percentages Results: There were 1532 medical consultations and 290 hospitalizations evaluated A drop of 55 8% in the number of medical consultations during the QP (37% due to dyspnea, 45% due to chest pain, 72% due to hypertension) was observed There was a 47 2% drop in the number of hospitalizations in the QP (55 6% decompensated heart failure, 44 9% NSTEMI, 26 9% STEMI) Conclusions: The recent pandemic caused by COVID-19 is associated with a significant drop in the rate of consultations by the emergency service and in the number of hospitalizations in the coronary unit, regardless of their etiology, which may significantly impact the morbidity and mortality of patients with cardiovascular pathology