Trends in mental health-related pediatric emergency visits among New York City students

Recent studies highlight an increase in pediatric mental health disorders, amplified by COVID-19. This study examines changes in mental health-related emergency department visits among New York City public school students across the pandemic timeline.

We employed logistic regression to examine changes in the probability of a student's emergency department visit being mental health-related, and as a secondary outcome, we analyzed the difference in same-day discharge rates between mental health-related visits and other visits. For this analysis, we used the New York City Student Population Health Registry to link public school students' records to emergency department visit data.

No significant linear trends were observed in the average monthly probability of a mental health-related visit before March 2020. From March 2020 through June 2021 there was an increase for all groups except male elementary school students. Female middle and high school students experienced the largest increase (0.031 (CI = [0.027, 0.034])) compared to pre-pandemic (0.103 (CI = [0.103, 0.104])). Post-June 2021, all groups experienced a lower probability except for female middle and high school students, who had a 0.009 (CI = [0.007, 0.011]) higher probability than during the pandemic. Compared to the pre-pandemic period and non-mental health-related visits, a 0.043 (CI = [0.029, 0.057]) lower probability of same-day discharge was observed for mental health-related visits during the pandemic period.

The COVID-19 pandemic correlated with a significant increase in mental health-related emergency department visits and longer stays, particularly among female middle and high school students.