Impact of COVID-19 Pandemic and Lockdown Measures on the Nutrition Plan Service Cohort

Objective: This study analyses the patients' factors can influence the attitude to follow or not the therapeutic weight-loss plan after national lockdown measures adopted from March 2020 to May 2020. Materials and Methods: Patients that visited a private nutritional center in March 2020 were included in this retrospective observational study. All relevant characteristics were noted. In May 2020, patients who did not attend the follow-up visit were labeled as "abandoned". Variation in Body Mass Index (BMI) was noted in the second visit. Univariate logistic regression was performed to test the influence on dependent variables (lost follow-up). Odds Ratio (OR) was calculated. According to BMI distribution, we performed a Student T-test (α= 0.05) or Wilcoxon test (α= 0.05) to test BMI variation in patients that attended the follow-up visit. A P-value< 0.05 was considered statistically significant. Results: Our population consisted of 77 patients, and 26 patients (33.8%, CI95% 23.4-45.4%) were labelled as "abandoned". Age≥ 54 years old (OR= 8.9048, CI95%:1.888-41.9822, P-value= 0.0057) and suffering from hypertension (OR= 4.8706, CI95%:1.4284-16.6076, Pvalue= 0.0114) were factors associated with the abandon follow-up visits. Wilcoxon test for BMI variation resulted statistically significant (May BMI 29.5 kg/m2 vs March BMI 29.4 kg/m2 , Pvalue= 0.0094). Conclusion: Age and hypertension are related to the risk of abandoning healthcare services after ending the national lockdown. The losing follow-up phenomenon could worsen clinical conditions and reduce life expectancy. An increase in BMI during lockdown should be interpreted as a personal difficulty in complying with therapeutic prescriptions.