The burden of COVID-19 care in community and academic intensive care units in Ontario, Canada: a retrospective cohort study

During the COVID-19 pandemic, neighbourhoods with high material deprivation and high proportions of racialized Canadians were disproportionately affected by COVID-19. Many of these neighbourhoods were served by community hospitals. We sought to compare the burden of COVID-19 care in community and academic intensive care units (ICUs) in Ontario, Canada.

We included all adult patients admitted to Ontario ICUs with COVID-19 between 1 March 2020 and 31 July 2021 in a retrospective cohort study. We compared patient volumes, demographics, interventions, and outcomes between community hospital corporations (CHCs) and academic hospital corporations (AHCs).

During the first three waves of the pandemic, 9,651 adult ICU admissions for COVID-19 were reported across 72 hospital corporations in Ontario: 6,902 (71.5%) in CHCs and 2,749 (28.5%) in AHCs. Days of ICU care per baseline ICU bed were highest in large CHCs (> 10 baseline ICU beds) relative to AHCs and small CHCs (median [interquartile range], 73.7 [53.8–110.6] vs 42.2 [32.7–71.8] vs 21.4 [7.2–40.3]; Kruskal–Wallis test, P < 0.001). Among direct ICU admissions, CHC patients had greater severity of illness whereas among transfer ICU admissions, AHC patients were more severely ill. In a multivariable logistic regression model, mortality was similar among patients with index admission to a CHC or AHC; however, patients with index admission to an AHC were more likely to receive extracorporeal membrane oxygenation (adjusted odds ratio, 6.16; 95% confidence interval, 4.72 to 8.11).

During the pandemic, Ontario’s large CHCs provided significantly more days of ICU COVID-19 care per baseline ICU bed compared with AHCs and small CHCs. Equipping large CHCs to handle ICU surges during future emerging disease outbreaks should be a priority for pandemic preparedness.