Impact of the first wave of the SARS-CoV-2/Covid-19 pandemic on digestive surgical activities: a Belgian National Survey

Belgium was one of the first European countries affected by the first wave of the Covid-19 epidemic after Italy and France and has the highest rate of Covid-19-related deaths. Very few studies have evaluated the impact of the pandemic on surgical activity on a large scale. The primary objective of this national survey was to evaluate the impact of the first wave of the Covid-19 pandemic on surgical activities (elective non-oncological and oncological) in Belgian hospitals. A nationwide, multicenter survey was conducted in Belgium by the Royal Belgian Surgical Society (RBSS) board. The question... Mehr ...

Verfasser: Gabriel Liberale (5285945)
Hans Van Veer (10990713)
Jean Lemaitre (10990716)
Marc Duinslager (10990719)
Dirk Ysebaert (84927)
Arnaud De Roover (10990722)
Charles de Gheldere (10990725)
Niels Komen (4988303)
Dokumenttyp: Dataset
Erscheinungsdatum: 2021
Schlagwörter: Medicine / Neuroscience / Sociology / Cancer / Science Policy / Computational Biology / Covid-19 / surgical activity / Belgium / digestive surgery / survey
Sprache: unknown
Permalink: https://search.fid-benelux.de/Record/base-29358044
Datenquelle: BASE; Originalkatalog
Powered By: BASE
Link(s) : https://doi.org/10.6084/m9.figshare.14804895.v1

Belgium was one of the first European countries affected by the first wave of the Covid-19 epidemic after Italy and France and has the highest rate of Covid-19-related deaths. Very few studies have evaluated the impact of the pandemic on surgical activity on a large scale. The primary objective of this national survey was to evaluate the impact of the first wave of the Covid-19 pandemic on surgical activities (elective non-oncological and oncological) in Belgian hospitals. A nationwide, multicenter survey was conducted in Belgium by the Royal Belgian Surgical Society (RBSS) board. The questionnaire focused on digestive surgical activity at different time points: period 1 (P1), before the epidemic; period 2 (P2), lockdown; and period 3 (P3), after stabilization of the epidemic. The participation rate in the survey was 28.2% (24 out of 85 solicited hospitals), including 15 (62.5%) from the French speaking part of Belgium and 9 (37.5%) from the Flemish speaking part. Eighteen (75%) were non-academic and 6 (25%) were academic hospitals. All surgical activities were impacted by the Covid-19 pandemic except for the number of cholecystectomies. No statistical differences were observed between regions or according to the type of hospital. Our national survey confirms that the COVID-19 outbreak has severely impacted in-person consultations and surgical activity for benign and malignant disease and for acute appendicitis. However, procedures for benign disease were much more affected than those for malignancies.