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Comment
. 2020 Jun;5(3):e000810.
doi: 10.1136/esmoopen-2020-000810.

Infection rate and clinical management of cancer patients during the COVID-19 pandemic: experience from a tertiary care hospital in northern Italy

Dominic Fong  1 , Simon Rauch  2 , Christian Petter  3 , Eva Haspinger  4 , Monika Alber  4 , Manfred Mitterer  4
Affiliations
Comment

Infection rate and clinical management of cancer patients during the COVID-19 pandemic: experience from a tertiary care hospital in northern Italy

Dominic Fong et al. ESMO Open. 2020 Jun.

Abstract

Background: Optimal management of patients with cancer during COVID-19 pandemic is still pending.

Methods: Our patients were advised to maintain their scheduled appointments, and planned cancer treatment was continued without unnecessary delays in an outpatient setting. Additional strict preventive infection measures were rapidly implemented at our outpatient department. When COVID-19 test became widely available, universal testing of healthcare workers and vigorous screening of all patients coming to our facility for COVID-19 infection were performed by SARS-CoV-2 real-time reverse transcription PCR on rhinopharyngeal swab.

Results: As of the data cut-off on 9 April 2020, a total of 156 oncology patients with a median age of 67 (range 26-86) years and 63 haematology patients (median age 69 years, range 23-89) were screened for COVID-19 during active cancer treatment. Prevalence (1.8%; 4/219) of COVID-19 in patients with cancer was significantly higher compared with a respective control group of asymptomatic counterparts (p=0.018). Outcomes of COVID-19 positive patients were good, with only one observed death due to progression of advanced metastatic disease.

Conclusion: Our data indicate that continuation of anticancer treatment in epidemic areas during the COVID-19 pandemic seems to be safe and feasible, if adequate and strict preventive measures are vigorously and successfully carried out.

Keywords: COVID-19; cancer; coronavirus.

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Conflict of interest statement

Competing interests: DF declares travel, accommodation, expenses supported by Sanofi and Ipsen outside the submitted work. CP declares non-financial support from Innova outside the submitted work. EH declares travel, accommodation, expenses supported by Roche and received honoraria from Novartis, Boehringer Ingelheim and AstraZeneca outside the submitted work. MM declares travel, accommodation, expenses supported by Ipsen and Celgene and received honoraria from Janssen outside the submitted work.

Figures

Figure 1
Figure 1
Comparison of the prevalence (in percent) of COVID-19 infection among different subgroups. SORA: prevalence of COVID-19 infection in asymptomatic individuals tested for COVID-19 within the SORA-trial; cancer patients: prevalence of COVID-19 infection in patients on active outpatient cancer treatment tested for COVID-19 from our hospital; symptomatic patients/contacts: prevalence of COVID-19 infection in symptomatic COVID-19 patients and their close contacts registered in our healthcare district. Statistical significance was determined using χ2/Fisher’s exact test.
See this image and copyright information in PMC

Comment on

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