![]() ![]() Incident asthma was defined using a combination of International Classification of Diseases, Version 10, Clinical Modification (ICD-10-CM) diagnosis codes (J45) and location and timing of medical services (≥ 1 inpatient hospitalization, ≥ 2 outpatient visits ≥ 8 weeks apart, or ≥ 1 outpatient visits plus dispensing of disease-specific medications within 1 month). We identified members under 18 years old with ≥ 12 months of baseline continuous enrollment without a prior diagnosis of asthma. We conducted this study using the HealthCore Integrated Research Database (March 2016–February 2021), a large US commercial claims database. To examine whether the incidence of new asthma diagnoses in children in the United States changed during the early stages of the COVID-19 pandemic, we performed a retrospective cohort study. These findings raise important questions whether pandemic-related changes in infectious or other triggers truly altered the incidence of childhood asthma beyond the well-described disruptions in healthcare access. New diagnoses of childhood asthma in the US declined by half during the first year of the pandemic. The covariate-adjusted pandemic-associated incidence rate ratio was 0.47 (95% confidence interval 0.43, 0.51). ResultsĬompared with 3 years prior to the pandemic, crude incident diagnosis rates of asthma decreased by 52% across the first four quarters of the US pandemic. Crude quarterly rates of asthma diagnosis per 1000 children were calculated, and the incidence rate ratio and 95% confidence interval were estimated for newly diagnosed asthma during versus before the pandemic using negative binomial regression, adjusted for age, sex, region, and season. Incident asthma was defined using a combination of diagnosis codes, location of services, and medication dispensing. We conducted a retrospective cohort study of children under age 18 without a prior diagnosis of asthma within a large US commercial claims database. ![]() Prior studies have documented declines in pediatric asthma exacerbations and asthma-related health care utilization during the COVID-19 pandemic, but less is known about the incidence of asthma during the pandemic. ![]()
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
Details
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |