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Review
. 2022 Jan 28;6(1):1-8.
doi: 10.23922/jarc.2021-074. eCollection 2022.

Colorectal Surgery in the COVID-19 Pandemic Era

Masaaki Miyo  1 , Tsuyoshi Hata  2 , Yuki Sekido  2 , Takayuki Ogino  2 , Norikatsu Miyoshi  2 , Hidekazu Takahashi  2 , Mamoru Uemura  2 , Junichi Nishimura  3 , Masakazu Ikenaga  4 , Hidetoshi Eguchi  2 , Yuichiro Doki  2 , Tsunekazu Mizushima  5
Affiliations
Review

Colorectal Surgery in the COVID-19 Pandemic Era

Masaaki Miyo et al. J Anus Rectum Colon. .

Abstract

The novel coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) caused by the new severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) has spread at a very fast rate, overwhelming and disrupting healthcare systems around the world since its outbreak in December 2019 in China. As of October 2021, the total number of COVID-19 cases exceeds 240,000,000, and the total number of deaths is close to 5,000,000. In the situation of widespread SARS-CoV-2 infection, restrictions on the medical system due to shifts in medical care to accommodate the pandemic will occur, and its impact on surgical and endoscopic treatment for colorectal cancer is inevitable. Therefore, it is necessary to satisfy all of the following requirements: patient safety, prevention of exposure of healthcare workers including surgeons, prevention of nosocomial infection, and a decision on how to treat the primary disease. Surgical triage is also required, based on comprehensive consideration of the patient's condition, the severity of the disease, the SARS-CoV-2 infection situation in the region, and the medical supply system at each facility, including medical resources, human resources, and the availability of medical equipment. Understanding the diagnostic and treatment environment that the COVID-19 pandemic has dramatically changed is important in providing appropriate surgical care to patients who require surgery while taking utmost care to prevent the spread of COVID-19.

Keywords: COVID-19; colorectal cancer; pandemic; surgery.

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Conflict of interest statement

Conflicts of Interest There are no conflicts of interest.

Figures

Figure 1.
Figure 1.
Trend of COVID-19-infected patients worldwide. Daily cases (A), total cases (B), daily deaths (C), and total deaths (D) are shown. Ordinate: number of cases; abscissa: time series. Data from Johns Hopkins University are available at https://github.com/CSSEGISandData/COVID-19.
Figure 2.
Figure 2.
Trend of COVID-19-infected patients in Japan. Daily cases (A), total cases (B), daily deaths (C), and total deaths (D) are shown. Ordinate: number of cases; abscissa: time series. Data from the Ministry of Health, Labor, and Welfare are available at https://www.mhlw.go.jp/stf/covid-19/open-data.html.
Figure 3.
Figure 3.
Trend of number of people receiving medical examinations in Japan. Ordinate: number of cases; abscissa: time series. Data from the Japan Society of Health Evaluation and Promotion are available at https://jhep.jp/jhep/top/index.jsp.
See this image and copyright information in PMC

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