Estimation of the number of general anesthesia cases based on a series of nationwide surveys on Twitter during COVID-19 in Japan: A statistical analysis
Abstract
Purpose
The coronavirus disease (COVID-19), caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2), has spread to more than 200 other countries. In light of this situation, the Japanese Government declared a state of emergency in seven regions of Japan on April 7, 2020, under the provisions of the law. The medical care delivery system has been under pressure. Although various surgical societies have published guidelines on which to base their surgical decisions, it is not clear how general anesthesia has been performed and will be performed in Japan.
Methods
One of the services provided by Twitter is a voting function—Twitter Polls—through which anonymous surveys can be conducted. We used quadratic programming to analyze the results of a series of 17 surveys on Twitter, over the course of 22 weeks. The analysis focused on solving the mathematical optimizing problem on the status of operating restrictions. Public data provided by the Japanese Government were used to estimate the current changes in the number of general anesthesia performed in Japan.
Results
The minimum number of general anesthesia per week was estimated at 66.1%, compared to 2015, on April 27, 2020. The time series trend was compatible with the results reported by the Japanese Society of Anesthesiologists.
Conclusion
The number of general anesthesia was reduced by up to two-thirds during the COVID-19 pandemic in Japan, and was quantitatively estimated using the Twitter quick questionnaire.
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