Evidence map›Paper›PMID 37870037›Full record

ArticleSingapore medical journal2025

Mental health-related presentations to a tertiary emergency department during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Elijah Gin Lim, Ashley Ern Hui How, Julian Zhong Hui Lee, Sameera Ganti, Eunizar Omar

Abstract read
In one paragraph

Article in Singapore medical journal, 2025. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 2 papers.

0numbers the graph read from it
0cells of the map it votes in
2citing papers in PubMed
–field-weighted citation impact
1 · What the graph read from it

What it found

Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.

The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.

2 · The registry

The trial behind it

Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.

Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.

3 · Its place in the literature

Who cites it

2 citing papers in PubMed.

  1. Article
  2. Descriptive study of mental health care users 12 months pre- and post-COVID-19 lockdown.The South African journal of psychiatry : SAJP : the journal of the Society of Psychiatrists of South Africa · 2024
    Article
4 · The record

Corrections and comments

PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.

5 · Who and what money

Authors and funding

5 authors.

Elijah Gin LimYong Loo Lin School of Medicine, National University of Singapore, Singapore.
Ashley Ern Hui HowLee Kong Chian School of Medicine, Nanyang Technological University, Singapore.
Julian Zhong Hui LeeDepartment of Statistics and Applied Probability, National University of Singapore, Singapore.
Sameera GantiNewcastle University Medicine, Malaysia.
Eunizar OmarDepartment of Emergency Medicine, Sengkang General Hospital, Singapore.

Funding

No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.

6 · The paper itself

Abstract

introductionThe coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic has caused significant mental distress in populations globally. At the frontline of the pandemic, emergency departments (EDs) are the prime setting to observe the effects of the pandemic on the mental health of the population. We aimed to describe the trend of mental health-related ED attendances at an acute hospital in Singapore before and during the various stages of the COVID-19 pandemic.

methodsThis is a retrospective, descriptive study of patients who presented to the ED between 1 January 2019 and 31 December 2020. Patients diagnosed with mental health-related systematised nomenclature of medicine who visited the ED during this period were identified and were placed into mental health diagnosis categories for analysis. A comparison was made between patients who presented before the pandemic (2019) and during the pandemic (2020).

resultsDuring the study periods, we identified 1,421 patients, of whom 27 were excluded due to non-mental health-related diagnoses, leaving 1,394 patients for analysis. There was a 36.7% increase in mental health-related ED presentations from 2019 to 2020. The proportion of higher-acuity mental health-related ED attendances and number of suicide attempts also increased.

conclusionOur study described an increase in the proportion of high-acuity mental health-related ED attendances during the COVID-19 pandemic. Emergency physicians must be cognisant of the effects of the pandemic on mental health. Further research should be conducted to better equip the healthcare system for handling all aspects of the pandemic.

Indexed as

COVID-19Emergency Service, HospitalMental DisordersMental HealthAdolescentAdultAgedFemaleHumansMaleMiddle AgedPandemicsRetrospective StudiesSARS-CoV-2SingaporeSuicide, AttemptedCOVID-19emergency medicinepandemicpsychiatrypublic health

Identifiers

PMID37870037
PMCPMC12747451

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Registered trials

None linked

Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.