Background Limited data are available on the relationship between infant and pediatric asthma and severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (COVID-19). Political limitations such as school closure may affect the treatment behavior of pediatric asthma. To investigate the trends of treatment behavior in the field of pediatrics during the COVID-19 pandemic. Methods This is a retrospective observational study using Diagnosis Procedure Combination (DPC) data from the Quality Indicator/Improvement Project (QIP) database. We identified children with asthma aged 15 years or younger who were patients from July 1, 2018, to June 30, 2020. The main outcome was a comparison between asthma patients' treatment behavior before the COVID-19 pandemic and during the COVID-19 pandemic. We statistically tested the admission volume changes based on the discharge date after adjusting for seasonality through a Fourier term using an interrupted time-series analysis (ITS). Results We identified 10,481 inpatients cases in 67 hospitals and 258,911 out-patients cases in 180 hospitals who were diagnosed with asthma. We performed ITS analysis for inpatients. The reduction in the number of patients during this period was estimated to be 232 (P=0.001). In addition, ITS analysis was performed for patients aged <3 years. The reduced number of patients during this period was estimated to be 155 (P<0.001). Conclusions We found that the number of pediatric asthma patients dramatically decreased during the COVID-19 pandemic. We need to continue research into the trends of pediatric asthma patients after the COVID-19 pandemic in Japan.

中文翻译：

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COVID-19大流行对婴儿和小儿哮喘的影响：使用日本的一个管理数据库进行的多中心调查

背景技术关于婴儿和小儿哮喘与严重急性呼吸系统综合症冠状病毒2（COVID-19）之间关系的可用数据有限。政治上的局限性，例如学校停课，可能会影响小儿哮喘的治疗行为。调查COVID-19大流行期间儿科领域治疗行为的趋势。方法这是一项回顾性观察研究，使用来自质量指标/改进项目（QIP）数据库的诊断程序组合（DPC）数据。我们确定了从2018年7月1日到2020年6月30日为15岁以下的哮喘患儿。主要结果是比较COVID-19大流行之前和COVID-19大流行期间哮喘患者的治疗行为。在使用间断时间序列分析（ITS）通过傅立叶项对季节性进行调整后，我们根据出院日期对入院量的变化进行了统计测试。结果我们在67所医院中确诊了10481例住院病例，在180所医院中确诊了哮喘的258911例门诊病例。我们对住院患者进行了ITS分析。在此期间，患者数量的减少估计为232（P = 0.001）。此外，对<3岁的患者进行了ITS分析。在此期间减少的患者数量估计为155（P <0.001）。结论我们发现，在COVID-19大流行期间，小儿哮喘患者的数量急剧减少。在日本发生COVID-19大流行之后，我们需要继续研究小儿哮喘患者的趋势。