Impact of COVID-19 on the management and outcomes of ureteric stones in the UK: a multicentre retrospective study.
Byrne MHV., Georgiades F., Light A., Lovegrove CE., Dominic C., Rahman J., Kathiravelupillai S., Klatte T., Saeb-Parsy K., Kumar R., Howles S., Stewart GD., Turney B., Wiseman O., COVID Stones Collaborative None.
OBJECTIVES: To determine if management of ureteric stones in the UK changed during the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic and whether this affected patient outcomes. PATIENTS AND METHODS: We conducted a multicentre retrospective study of adults with computed tomography-confirmed ureteric stone disease at 39 UK hospitals during a pre-pandemic period (23/3/2019-22/6/2019) and a period during the pandemic (the 3-month period after the first severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus-2 case at individual sites). The primary outcome was success of primary treatment modality, defined as no further treatment required for the index ureteric stone. Our study protocol was published prior to data collection. RESULTS: A total of 3735 patients were included (pre-pandemic 1956 patients; pandemic 1779 patients). Stone size was similar between groups (P > 0.05). During the pandemic, patients had lower hospital admission rates (pre-pandemic 54.0% vs pandemic 46.5%, P