Abstract 220: Public Defibrillator Accessibility and Mobility Trends During the Covid-19 Pandemic in Canada

• Published in: Circulation (New York, N.Y.) Vol. 142; no. Suppl_4
• Main Authors: Leung, K.H. Benjamin, Alam, Rejuana, Brooks, Steven, Chan, Timothy C
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: 17.11.2020
• ISSN: 0009-7322; 1524-4539
• DOI: 10.1161/circ.142.suppl_4.220

Abstract only Introduction: The COVID-19 pandemic has led to widespread closures of non-essential businesses and buildings. The impact of such closures on public automated external defibrillator (AED) accessibility compared to mobility trends is unknown. Methods: We identified all publicly available online AED registries in Canada last updated May 1, 2019 or later. AEDs were classified by location type using addresses and registry notes, and deemed completely inaccessible, partially inaccessible, or unaffected using government-issued closure orders as of May 1, 2020. We mapped AED location types to categories used by Google’s COVID-19 Community Mobility Reports and calculated the median percent change in daily traffic between Feb. 15 - May 1, 2020 (excluding Apr. 10-12). We compared the percent of completely inaccessible AEDs to the median percent change in traffic for each category. Results: We identified three provincial (British Columbia, Alberta, Nova Scotia) and two municipal (Mississauga and Toronto in Ontario) online AED registries, collectively covering 13.1 million people. Of the 5,845 AEDs identified, 69.9% were completely inaccessible, 18.8% were partially inaccessible, and 11.3% were unaffected. AEDs in parks (n=141), almost all retail and recreational locations (n=1,539), and two-thirds of workplaces (n=3,633) were completely inaccessible, grocery and pharmacy-based (n=173) AEDs were partially inaccessible, and transit station (n=277) and residential (n=85) AEDs were unaffected. The largest discrepancies between AED accessibility and mobility occurred in parks (100% completely inaccessible vs. 10.5% traffic decrease), retail and recreation (99.0% completely inaccessible vs. 48.0% traffic decrease), and transit stations (100% unaffected vs. 63.0% traffic decrease). Conclusion: Government-mandated closures due to the COVID-19 pandemic have led to a greater reduction in AED accessibility than mobility in many locations across Canada.