Study design
A retrospective review of all patients affected by urgent or non-deferrable sinonasal or skull base diseases who were treated at the Division of Otorhinolaryngology of the University Hospital of Varese (Italy) between February 24th, 2020 and April 21st, 2020 (PANDEMIC-Group), was carried out. All other non-sinus and skull base urgent cases treated at our hospital have been excluded from the present analysis. Epidemiological and clinical data, surgical reports, complications, and follow-up information were reviewed, as well as COVID-19 detection tests (e.g. nasopharyngeal swab results). A retrospective analysis of all patients affected by sinonasal or skull base diseases, surgically treated at our institution in the same two-month period of 2019 (CONTROL-Group) was carried out. Epidemiological, clinical, surgical and follow-up data of such patients were retrieved as well. The PANDEMIC-Group was compared with the CONTROL-Group in order to evaluate the changes of our surgical activity in terms of volume cases, diseases treated, patient’s geographical origin and hospitalization time.