How COVID Waves Changed ED Wait Times and ICU Risks in a Chinese Hospital

The research team looked at how the COVID‑19 crisis reshaped emergency care in a regional hospital in central China. They focused on three time points: 2019 (before the pandemic), 2021 (mid‑pandemic), and 2023 (after the peak). The goal was to see if patients spent more or less time in the emergency department and whether their chance of needing intensive care changed across these phases.

The study followed every patient who entered the ED resuscitation area during those years. It used non‑parametric tests to compare length of stay and built Cox models to track ICU admission risk. To be sure the findings were solid, the team ran extra checks, such as splitting the 2021 data, removing extreme wait times, and calculating an E‑value.

In total, 44,161 patients were included. For those who left the ED without admission, the median wait grew from roughly 248 minutes before the pandemic to about 262 minutes during the crisis (P=.047). Even after the wave passed, the median stayed higher at 258 minutes (P<.001). Similar trends were observed among patients who were admitted, though the exact numbers were not highlighted.

The results suggest that the pandemic left a lasting imprint on emergency department crowding and the likelihood of needing ICU care. Hospitals may need to keep a close eye on these patterns to avoid future bottlenecks. The analysis also shows that simple statistical tools can reveal important shifts in patient flow over time.