Observational studyBMJ open2024
Trends in inequalities in avoidable hospitalisations across the COVID-19 pandemic: a cohort study of 23.5 million people in England.
Observational study in BMJ open, 2024. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 4 papers.
What it found
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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.
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.
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Who cites it
4 citing papers in PubMed.
- Which social determinants of health and long-term conditions contribute to inequalities in avoidable emergency hospital admissions? A decomposition analysis of small-area data in England.BMJ public health · 2026Article
- Age- and disability-based trends in potentially preventable hospitalizations: evidence from nationwide claims data in Korea.Epidemiology and health · 2026Article
- Article
- Associations between self-reported healthcare disruption due to covid-19 and avoidable hospital admission: evidence from seven linked longitudinal studies for England.BMJ (Clinical research ed.) · 2023Observational
Corrections and comments
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Authors and funding
12 authors.
Funding
Abstract
objectiveTo determine whether periods of disruption were associated with increased 'avoidable' hospital admissions and wider social inequalities in England.
designObservational repeated cross-sectional study.
settingEngland (January 2019 to March 2022).
participantsWith the approval of NHS England we used individual-level electronic health records from OpenSAFELY, which covered ~40% of general practices in England (mean monthly population size 23.5 million people). PRIMARY AND SECONDARY OUTCOME MEASURES: We estimated crude and directly age-standardised rates for potentially preventable unplanned hospital admissions: ambulatory care sensitive conditions and urgent emergency sensitive conditions. We considered how trends in these outcomes varied by three measures of social and spatial inequality: neighbourhood socioeconomic deprivation, ethnicity and geographical region.
resultsThere were large declines in avoidable hospitalisations during the first national lockdown (March to May 2020). Trends increased post-lockdown but never reached 2019 levels. The exception to these trends was for vaccine-preventable ambulatory care sensitive admissions which remained low throughout 2020-2021. While trends were consistent by each measure of inequality, absolute levels of inequalities narrowed across levels of neighbourhood socioeconomic deprivation, Asian ethnicity (compared with white ethnicity) and geographical region (especially in northern regions).
conclusionsWe found no evidence that periods of healthcare disruption from the COVID-19 pandemic resulted in more avoidable hospitalisations. Falling avoidable hospital admissions has coincided with declining inequalities most strongly by level of deprivation, but also for Asian ethnic groups and northern regions of England.
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