Brief Report: The Impact of COVID‐19 on Emergency Department Overdose Diagnoses and County Overdose Deaths
Jacob Shreffler, Hugh Shoff, J. Jeremy Thomas, Martin Huecker
Abstract
BACKGROUND AND OBJECTIVES: We sought to understand the impact of COVID-19 on emergency department (ED) overdoses and county coroner verified overdose deaths. METHODS: Electronic medical health record and county coroner data were gathered and comparisons were made between three 16-week time periods. In the three time periods, 873 individuals had an overdose diagnosis in the ED and 440 individuals in the county died of drug overdose. RESULTS: While total ED patient volume decreased substantially, the number of ED overdose patients increased between March 6 and June 25, 2020. Furthermore, during this same period, coroner data revealed an increase in overdose deaths. CONCLUSION AND SCIENTIFIC SIGNIFICANCE: This preliminary evidence provides a key insight into the impact of COVID-19 on both overdose presentations to the ED and county overdose deaths. These results emphasize the critical need for increasing vigilance to prevent overdose by continuously developing and optimizing both accessible and quality treatment as we navigate through this pandemic and its ongoing effects on persons with substance use disorder. (Am J Addict 2021;00:00-00).