Impact of COVID-19 on Cleft Surgical Care

Background: Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) has greatly impacted pediatric healthcare facilities throughout the United States due to widespread case rescheduling and the implementation of supplementary COVID-19 perioperative protocols To our knowledge, no studies have investigated the impact of COVID-19 on case volume, surgical timing, or operational aspects of cleft surgical procedures The aim of this study is to investigate the impact that COVID-19 has had on cleft surgical care at our institution Methods: A retrospective study comparing cleft surgical care in 2019 (the pre-pandemic cohort) and 2020 (the COVID-19 cohort) was designed All patients who underwent a cleft surgical procedure from April 1st to August 31st in 2019 and 2020 were included for analysis Procedures were stratified into 4 groups: primary cleft lip repairs, primary cleft palate repairs, alveolar bone grafting procedures, and revisional/secondary repair procedures Variables investigated in this study included: surgical volume, number of patients receiving timely surgery, causes for untimely surgery, number of combined cases, number of delayed cases, delay time, time under anesthesia, and procedure length Results: A total of 191 cleft surgeries, 102 in 2019 and 89 in 2020, were identified during the study period We observed no statistically significant differences in cleft surgical volume and other investigated variables across all surgical subgroups from 2019 to 2020 Conclusion: Cleft surgical care was largely unaffected by COVID-19 despite high rates of case rescheduling and the addition of supplementary perioperative safety protocols More studies are needed to assess the impact of COVID-19 on cleft surgical care at other cleft centers and to investigate the long-term outcomes of these patients