The Cause and Duration of Emergency Admissions to Hospital in People with Idiopathic Parkinson’s Disease, Under the Care of a UK Service, During the First Year of the COVID-19 Pandemic

Abstract

Background: People with Parkinson’s disease (PD) have higher rates of hospitalisation and healthcare utilisation compared to the general population. The COVID-19 pandemic caused significant changes in admissions to hospital and access to healthcare. People with PD are some of the most vulnerable to such changes. There is no pre-existing data on the cause and duration of admission to hospital of people with PD during the COVID-19 pandemic. Objective: To determine the cause, duration, and outcome of hospital admissions to Northumbria Healthcare NHS Foundation Trust (NHCFT) for people with idiopathic Parkinson’s disease (IPD) in 2020. Methods: All people with IPD who had an emergency admission to NHCFT between 01/01/2020 and 31/12/2020 were identified. Demographic and disease characteristics, the number, duration, cause of admission and the location prior to admission were collected from an audit of medical notes. Results: 271 people with IPD had one or more emergency admissions to NHCFT between 01/01/2020 and 31/12/2020. There was a total of 453 emergency admissions, with a median duration of 5 (IQR 2-13) days. The most common causes of admission to hospital were PD-related motor dysfunction (includes falls with no other underlying cause or associated injury) and injury (includes falls with fracture), at 78 (17.2%) and 70 (15.5%) respectively. Conclusions: People with IPD had a short duration but high number of emergency admissions to hospital. Our chronological data on number of admissions shows a peak in admissions during August 2020. As a result of these findings and emerging data we suggest that individuals with PD deconditioned during 2020.