Table. Distribution of Laryngectomy Procedures Performed Before and During the COVID-19 Pandemic.
| Variable | Laryngectomy patients by COVID-19 period, No (%) | Standardized differencea | P value | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Before COVID-19 (n = 465) | During COVID-19 (n = 111) | |||
| Age, y | ||||
| Mean (SD) | 65.67 (10.04) | 66.71 (8.72) | 0.11 | .32 |
| Median (IQR) | 66.0 (60.0-73.0) | 66.0 (61.0-73.0) | 0.08 | .48 |
| Sex on RPDB | ||||
| Female | 77 (16.6) | 18 (16.2) | 0.01 | .93 |
| Male | 388 (83.4) | 93 (83.8) | 0.01 | |
| Elixhauser Scoreb | ||||
| Mean (SD) | 2.37 (1.78) | 2.46 (1.73) | 0.05 | .68 |
| Median (IQR) | 2.0 (1.0-3.0) | 2.0 (1.0-3.0) | 0.06 | .66 |
| Income quintile | ||||
| 1 (lowest) | 137 (29.7) | 31 (28.2) | 0.03 | .99 |
| 2 | 96 (20.8) | 24 (21.8) | 0.03 | |
| 3 | 84 (18.2) | 21 (19.1) | 0.02 | |
| 4 | 66 (14.3) | 15 (13.6) | 0.02 | |
| 5 (highest) | 79 (17.1) | 19 (17.3) | 0 | |
| Immigrant | 37 (8.0) | 9 (8.1) | 0.01 | .81 |
| Deprivation quintilec | ||||
| 1 (least deprived) | 69 (15.2) | 16 (14.5) | 0.02 | .97 |
| 2 | 82 (18.0) | 23 (20.9) | 0.07 | |
| 3 | 81 (17.8) | 19 (17.3) | 0.01 | |
| 4 | 87 (19.1) | 23 (20.9) | 0.02 | |
| 5 (most deprived) | 136 (29.9) | 29 (26.4) | 0.04 | |
| Region | ||||
| Central | 88 (18.9) | 31 (27.9) | 0.21 | .10 |
| East | 122 (26.2) | 33 (29.7) | 0.08 | |
| North | 27 (5.8) | 7 (6.3) | 0.02 | |
| Toronto | 28 (6.0) | 7 (6.3) | 0.01 | |
| West | 200 (43.0) | 33 (29.7) | 0.28 | |
| Ruralityd | ||||
| 0-9 (least) | 290 (62.4) | 66 (59.5) | 0.06 | .81 |
| 10-30 | 90 (19.4) | 22 (19.8) | 0.01 | |
| 31-50 | 61 (13.1) | 15 (13.5) | 0.01 | |
| 51-70 | 13 (2.8) | 6 (5.4) | 0.13 | |
| ≥71 (most) | ≤5 | ≤5 | 0.07 | |
| Missing | ≤10 | ≤5 | 0.03 | |
| Urgente | 82 (17.6) | 20 (18.0) | 0.01 | .92 |
| Salvage laryngectomyf | 127 (27.3) | 28 (25.2) | 0.05 | .66 |
Abbreviations: IQR, interquartile range; RPDB, Registered Persons Database.
Standardized difference greater than 0.1 indicates a significant imbalance.
The Elixhauser comorbidity grouping is a well validated approach to assess comorbidities and uses a 5-year lookback window. A higher score indicates greater comorbidity.
Material deprivation is a composite measure of socioeconomic status, considering the proportion of a population without a high school diploma, single-parent families, receipt of government transfer payments, unemployment, low income, and living in dwellings that require major repair. Results are reported in quintiles.
Rural score was based on Rurality index score for Ontario version 2008. This measure takes into account community population and population density, travel time to nearest basic referral center and travel time to nearest advanced referral center.
Patients receiving urgent treatment arrived either by ambulance or through the emergency department.
We further classified laryngectomies as either primary or salvage. Whether or not a patient received curative radiation can be identified through the Ontario’s Cancer Activity Level Reporting System. Due to concerns about data completeness, however, we opted for a definition of more than 3 months from laryngeal cancer diagnosis to laryngectomy as indicative of salvage treatment.