Impact of the COVID-19 Pandemic on Regular Emergency Department Users

Regular users of the emergency department (ED) include both patients who could be better served in lower-acuity settings and those with high-severity conditions. ED use decreased during the COVID-19 pandemic, but patterns among regular ED users are unknown. To determine the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on this population, we examined quarterly postpandemic ED utilization among prepandemic regular ED users. Key subgroups included prepandemic ED users with regular visits for (1) low-severity conditions and (2) high-severity conditions.