Is the Increase in Record of Skin Wounds in Hospitalized Patients in Internal Medicine Units a Side Effect of the COVID-19 Pandemic?

Leticia Nieto-García, Adela Carpio-Pérez, María Teresa Moreiro-Barroso, Francisco Javier Rubio-Gil, Emilia Ruiz-Antúnez, Ainhoa Nieto-García and Montserrat Alonso-Sardón ()
Additional contact information
Leticia Nieto-García: School of Nursing and Physiotherapy, University of Salamanca, 37007 Salamanca, Spain
Adela Carpio-Pérez: Internal Medicine Service, Institute for Biomedical Research of Salamanca (IBSAL), University Hospital of Salamanca, 37007 Salamanca, Spain
María Teresa Moreiro-Barroso: Internal Medicine Service, University Hospital of Salamanca, 37007 Salamanca, Spain
Francisco Javier Rubio-Gil: Health Care Quality Unit, University Hospital of Salamanca, 37007 Salamanca, Spain
Emilia Ruiz-Antúnez: Training, Development and Innovation Area, University Hospital of Salamanca, 37007 Salamanca, Spain
Ainhoa Nieto-García: School of Nursing and Physiotherapy, University of Salamanca, 37007 Salamanca, Spain
Montserrat Alonso-Sardón: Preventive Medicine, Epidemiology and Public Health Area, University of Salamanca, 37007 Salamanca, Spain

IJERPH, 2023, vol. 20, issue 3, 1-12

Abstract: Wound care is an important public health challenge that is present in all areas of the healthcare system, whether in hospitals, long term care institutions or in the community. We aimed to quantify the number of skin wounds reported after and during the COVID-19 pandemic. This descriptive longitudinal retrospective study compared of wound records in patients hospitalized in the internal medicine service during the first year of the COVID-19 pandemic (from 1 March 2020, to 28 February 2021) and previous-year to the outbreak (from 1 January 2019, to 31 December 2019). A sample of 1979 episodes was collected corresponding to 932 inpatients, 434 from the pre-pandemic year and 498 from the first year of COVID-19 pandemic; 147 inpatients were diagnosed with SARS-CoV-2 infection (3.2%). The percentage of wound episodes in the first year of the COVID-19 pandemic was higher than the pre-pandemic year, 17.9% (1092/6090) versus 15% (887/5906), with a significant increase in the months with the highest incidence of COVID cases. This study shows an increase in the burden of wound care during the COVID-19 pandemic, and it could be attributable to the increase in the number of patients hospitalized for SARS-CoV-2 infection in internal medicine units.

Keywords: COVID-19; internal medicine; pressure ulcer; SARS-CoV-2; wounds (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: I I1 I3 Q Q5 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2023
References: View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.mdpi.com/1660-4601/20/3/2228/pdf (application/pdf)
https://www.mdpi.com/1660-4601/20/3/2228/ (text/html)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:gam:jijerp:v:20:y:2023:i:3:p:2228-:d:1047669

Access Statistics for this article

IJERPH is currently edited by Ms. Jenna Liu

More articles in IJERPH from MDPI
Bibliographic data for series maintained by MDPI Indexing Manager ().