Abstract
The emergence of Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome Coronavirus 2
(SARS-CoV-2) in December 2019, presumed from the city of Wuhan, Hubei
province in China and the subsequent declaration of the disease as a
pandemic by the World Health Organization (WHO) as COVID-19 in March
2020, had significant impact on health care systems globally. Each
country responded to this disease in different ways but broadly by
fortifying and prioritising health care provision as well as introducing
social lockdown aiming to contain the infection and minimizing the risk
of transmission. In the United Kingdom, a lockdown was introduced by the
government on 23rd of March 2020 and all health care services were
focussed to challenge the impact of COVID-19. To do so, the United
Kingdom National Health Service had to undergo widespread service
reconfigurations and the so-called “Nightingale Hospitals” were
created de novo to bolster bed provision and industries were asked to
direct efforts to the production of ventilators. A government led public
health campaign was publicised under the slogan of: “Stay home, Protect
the NHS (National Health Service), Save lives”. The approach had a
significant impact on delivery of all surgical services but particularly
cardiac surgery with its inherent critical care bed capacity. This paper
describes the impact on provision for elective and emergency cardiac
surgery in the United Kingdom, with a focus on Aorto-vascular disease.
We describe our Aorto-vascular activity and outcomes during the period
of UK lockdown and present a patient survey of attitudes to aortic
surgery during COVID-19 pandemic.