Patient visits to a psychiatric casualty clinic during the initial phase of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Ness, Ewa; Salvador, Erik Myrvang; Gardsjord, Erlend Strand

BACKGROUND We wished to investigate how the flow of patients to the Psychiatric Casualty Clinic in Oslo was affected during the acute phase of the COVID-19 pandemic. MATERIAL AND METHOD All patient records from the Psychiatric Casualty Clinic in Oslo from and including 13 March 2020 up to and including 1 April 2020 were compared with the patient records from the same period in 2019. Patient visits were registered as COVID-19-related when the patient came to the clinic for an issue linked to the pandemic. RESULTS The Psychiatric Casualty Clinic in Oslo had 105 patient visits in the period 13 March 2019-1 April 2019 and 63 in the same period for 2020 (-40 %). The number of admissions amounted to 16 in 2019 and 7 in 2020 (-56 %). The number of COVID-19-related consultations was 14/63 (22 %). There was a reduction in the number of patient visits for crisis reactions, from 28 in 2019 to 8 in 2020. INTERPRETATION The background for the decline in the flow of patients in the acute phase of the COVID-19 pandemic is most likely a complex one. We believe that patients primarily chose not to visit the clinic due to the risk of infection and the wish to avoid burdening the health services. With the reservation that our data are limited, it does not appear that increased access to psychiatric health services requiring physical attendance is indicated in the acute phase of a pandemic.