ArticleCMAJ open
Acute mental health service use following onset of the COVID-19 pandemic in Ontario, Canada: a trend analysis.
Article in CMAJ open. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 25 papers, 1 of them a synthesis that pooled it.
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Who cites it
25 citing papers in PubMed, 1 synthesis or guideline pooled it, 38 citations in OpenAlex.
- Mental health of Canadian youth: A systematic review and meta-analysis of studies examining changes in depression, anxiety, and suicide-related outcomes during the COVID-19 pandemic.Canadian journal of public health = Revue canadienne de sante publique · 2024Pooled it
- Improving transitions in care for children and youth with mental health concerns: implementation and evaluation of an emergency department mental health clinical pathway.BMC health services research · 2025Trial
- Virtual Care Expansion and Physician Follow-Up Among Youth With First Mental Health Contact Through a Hospital: Population-Based Repeated Cross-Sectional Study.JMIR mental health · 2026Article
- Consequences of the Coronavirus disease 2019 pandemic on child and adolescent mental, psychosocial, and physical health: A scoping review and interactive evidence map.Journal of child health care : for professionals working with children in the hospital and community · 2025Article
- COVID-19 in Rural Ontario Communities: Exploring Women's Mental Health During a Pandemic.International journal of environmental research and public health · 2025Article
- Changes in psychiatric admissions in the first year of COVID-19 in Ontario, Canada.International journal of mental health systems · 2025Article
- Effect of the COVID-19 Pandemic on Psychiatric Service Use Among Psychiatric Outpatients.Turk psikiyatri dergisi = Turkish journal of psychiatry · 2025Article
- Article
- The relationship between neighbourhood income and youth mental health service use differs by immigration experience: analysis of population-based data in British Columbia, Canada.International journal for equity in health · 2024Article
- Machine Learning Analysis of Factors Influencing Pediatric Telehealth Visits During COVID-19: A State-Level Comparison Using 2021-22 National Survey of Children's Health Data.Healthcare (Basel, Switzerland) · 2024Article
- Assessing the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on the mental health-related hospitalization rate of youth in Canada: an interrupted time series analysis.Health promotion and chronic disease prevention in Canada : research, policy and practice · 2024Article
- Adult psychiatric inpatient admissions and length of stay before and during the COVID-19 pandemic in a large urban hospital setting in Vancouver, British Columbia.Frontiers in health services · 2024Article
- Article
- Comparison of new psychiatric diagnoses among Finnish children and adolescents before and during the COVID-19 pandemic: A nationwide register-based study.PLoS medicine · 2023Article
- Self-harm emergency department visits in Canada during the COVID-19 pandemic: evidence from a sentinel surveillance system.Injury epidemiology · 2023Article
- Factors Affecting Self-Harm- or Violence-Related Urgent Psychiatric Consultation During the COVID-19 Pandemic in Taiwan.Psychology research and behavior management · 2023Article
- Mental health-related healthcare service utilisation and psychotropic drug dispensation trends in British Columbia during COVID-19 pandemic: a population-based study.General psychiatry · 2023Article
- Adherence to antipsychotic laboratory monitoring guidelines in children and youth: a population-based study.Frontiers in psychiatry · 2023Article
- New and continuing physician-based outpatient mental health care among children and adolescents during the COVID-19 pandemic in Ontario, Canada: a population-based study.Frontiers in psychiatry · 2023Article
- Article
Corrections and comments
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Authors and funding
11 authors at 1 institution in 2 countries.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
backgroundThe extent to which heightened distress during the COVID-19 pandemic translated to increases in severe mental health outcomes is unknown. We examined trends in psychiatric presentations to acute care settings in the first 12 months after onset of the pandemic.
methodsThis was a trends analysis of administrative population data in Ontario, Canada. We examined rates of hospitalizations and emergency department visits for mental health diagnoses overall and stratified by sex, age and diagnostic grouping (e.g., mood disorders, anxiety disorders, psychotic disorders), as well as visits for intentional self-injury for people aged 10 to 105 years, from January 2019 to March 2021. We used Joinpoint regression to identify significant inflection points after the onset of the pandemic in March 2020.
resultsAmong the 12 968 100 people included in our analysis, rates of mental health-related hospitalizations and emergency department visits declined immediately after the onset of the pandemic (peak overall decline of 30% [hospitalizations] and 37% [emergency department visits] compared to April 2019) and returned to near prepandemic levels by March 2021. Compared to April 2019, visits for intentional self-injury declined by 33% and remained below prepandemic levels until March 2021. We observed the largest declines in service use among adolescents aged 14 to 17 years (55% decline in hospitalizations, 58% decline in emergency department visits) and 10 to 13 years (56% decline in self-injury), and for those with substance-related disorders (33% decline in emergency department visits) and anxiety disorders (61% decline in hospitalizations).
interpretationContrary to expectations, the abrupt decline in acute mental health service use immediately after the onset of the pandemic and the return to near prepandemic levels that we observed suggest that changes and stressors in the first 12 months of the pandemic did not translate to increased service use. Continued surveillance of acute mental health service use is warranted.
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