Introduction: The coronavirus disease-19 (COVID-19) pandemic was associated with a large reduction in the number of attendances at emergency departments (EDs) in March 2020 in the United Kingdom (UK). We sought to identify which patient groups attended EDs least. Methods: Single-centre before and after study. We used routine administrative data from March 2020 and compared this to a composite control of March 2019 and February 2020. Results: Mean daily attendance fell by 30% from 342 patients per day in the composite control months to 242 patients per day in March 2020. Reductions in attendance were seen in almost all patient groups but were greatest in patients with injuries, those referred by another clinician, those arriving at the weekend, and in patients who received no investigations. Multivariate analysis revealed that the proportion of patients who were admitted to hospital fell, despite the patients being sicker, older, needing more investigations, and more likely to arrive by ambulance. Discussion: The reduction in ED attendances seen in the early phases of the UK pandemic occurred in all patient groups, but was greatest in the lower acuity patients. Reasons for this are complex and likely to be multifactorial.

A 40-year-old woman was referred to the Breast Unit with a solid lump in her right breast. Investigations revealed an invasive lobular carcinoma. The patient underwent a right-sided mastectomy and sentinel lymph node (LN) biopsy, which confirmed axillary LN involvement. The postsurgery staging CT showed unusual enlargement of mediastinal and hilar LN bilaterally. This was consistent with positron emission tomography/CT and MRI, which further established the presence of several bone lesions. Determining the pathology within the LN and bones was pivotal in providing an accurate diagnosis and deciding subsequent management. However, histopathological analysis of the initial endobronchial ultrasound-guided fine-needle aspiration biopsy of mediastinal LN failed to identify definitive metastatic breast cancer cells. The case was extensively discussed in several multidisciplinary team meetings. Collective evidence, including clinical presentation, comparative imaging analysis, and further biopsies confirmed sarcoidosis with bone involvement-mimicking metastatic disease.