Changes In Epidemiology Of Conjunctivitis In Hospital Banco De Olhos De Porto Alegre After The Outbreak Of Covid-19 Pandemic

The purpose of this paper is to evaluate the profile of the urgencies held in the emergency department of the Banco de Olhos Hospital emphasizing the infectious conjunctivitis and compare before and after the onset of the Coronavirus pandemic and social isolation both in public and private health care system.

This study was taken place at the emergency department of the Banco de Olhos Hospital, city of Porto Alegre, Brazil.

This is a retrospective and transversal study where the electronic files of the patients who visited the emergency department between March and June of 2019 and March and June 2020 were reviewed.

A significant reduction in the number of consultations at the emergency department was observed after the pandemic’s onset. From march to June 2019 21.678 visits were made. In the same period of 2020,this number was 14.194, a drop of 34.5%. It was noted that after the pandemic, the rate of visits having conjunctivitis as main cause also dropped significantly. The infectious conjunctivitis was the one who had the biggest decreased. In 2019 it was responsible for 30.2% and, at the same period, in 2020, this rate dropped to 15.5%, almost half of the number. In private health care system, this drop was bigger. It was not observed changes regarding the gender but it was noted a significantly increase in patients’ age visited from 2019 to 2020.  

The study showed a dramatic reduction in the number of visits at the emergency department of ophthalmology specially regarding infectious conjunctivitis and we believe that the cause is related with an increase of hygiene care, social isolation and restrictions caused by the Coronavirus pandemic.