How is the COVID-19 pandemic related to ingestion and aspiration of foreign bodies among children – single-institution experience

Introduction
This study aimed to evaluate the relevance of the COVID-19 pandemic and the consequent isolation policy on foreign body aspiration (FBA) or ingestion (FBI) reports among children.

Material and methods
A retrospective review of medical records between January 2018 and September 2021 was carried out to identify patients younger than 18 years who were admitted to the Paediatric Surgery and Urology Department, University Hospital in Wrocław, due to suspicion of a foreign body (FB) in their digestive or respiratory system. For each patient: age, sex, hospitalisation time, type of foreign body, its localisation, time and means for removal, and diagnostic approach were assessed.

Results
The study group comprised 236 children. The patients were divided into 2 groups including children that were admitted before and after the declaration of the state of pandemics in Poland (20 March 2020), which gives periods of 26 and 20 months, respectively. Those related to general admission number (as a percentage of all admissions) equal an average of 1.92% (of 6300) and 2.03% (of 3802), respectively. This resulted in 122 children before and 114 after the beginning of the pandemic. The age ranges were 6–203 months (me- dian 30) and 8–211 months (median 35), respectively. The most common types of foreign bodies were food, batteries, and coins. The new ones comprised magnetic pieces found in 12 children. Surgical intervention, which mostly included gastroscopy or rigid bronchoscopy, was undertaken in 186 cases – for the groups, 70 (57.4%) and 69 (60.5%) FBs, respectively, were removed. The assessed success rate was 71.43% and 78.41%, respectively.

Conclusions
The pandemic isolation policy seems to have had no major impact on FBI and FBA events.