This file photo taken on March 18, 2020, shows medical staff in protective suits working at a hospital emergency room in Daegu, 300 kilometers southeast of Seoul. (Yonhap)
SEOUL, April 21 (Korea Bizwire) — A recent study showed that the number of South Koreans who sought help for heart disease at hospital emergency rooms declined last year during the height of the COVID-19 crisis.
During this period, however, the mortality rate of myocardial infarction patients over 60 years of age increased after their hospitalization.
The study indicates that the spread of the pandemic aggravated the patients’ access to emergency medical services.
A joint research team from the National Medical Center and the Inha University Hospital conducted a comparative analysis between patients who visited hospital emergency rooms during the first wave of the outbreak from February 21 to April 1, 2020, and those who visited during the same period in 2018 and 2019, on the basis of National Emergency Department Information System data.
The analysis showed that the number of patients who visited hospital emergency rooms during the first wave of the COVID-19 pandemic stood at 401,378, down from 577,548 in 2018 and 598,514 in 2019.
Among those who visited hospital emergency rooms, the number of myocardial infarction patients accounted for 2,221, down from 2,437 in 2018 and 2,591 in 2019.
Despite the decline in the number of heart attack patients’ visits to hospital emergency rooms, the mortality rate of such patients in certain age groups showed a difference before and after the onset of COVID-19 pandemic.
The mortality rate within 30 days of treatment for myocardial infraction patients over 60 years of age who visited hospital emergency rooms during the first wave of the COVID-19 stood at 6 percent, higher than the 4.03 percent recorded in both 2018 and 2019.
J. S. Shin (js_shin@koreabizwire.com)
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