Serious Disruptions in Pediatric Cancer Care From COVID-19 medscape.com - get the latest breaking news, showbiz & celebrity photos, sport news & rumours, viral videos and top stories from medscape.com Daily Mail and Mail on Sunday newspapers.
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More than three quarters (78%) of hospitals surveyed between June and August 2020 reported that their paediatric cancer care had been affected by the pandemic.
Almost half (43%) made fewer new cancer diagnoses than expected, while around one third (34%) noted a rise in the number of patients abandoning treatment.
Nearly one in ten (7%) closed their paediatric cancer units completely at some stage during the pandemic.
Hospitals in low- and middle-income countries (LMICs) were disproportionately affected, with unavailability of chemotherapy, treatment abandonment, and disrupted radiotherapy among issues more frequently reported.
The COVID-19 pandemic has had major impacts on childhood cancer care worldwide, according to a survey of more than 300 clinicians from 200 hospitals worldwide published in The Lancet Child & Adolescent Health journal.
Kids cancer treatment disrupted at most hospitals worldwide due to COVID-19
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The COVID-19 pandemic has disrupted cancer treatment for children globally, a new study has found. Photo by Semevent/Pixabay
March 3 (UPI) Care for children with cancer has been disrupted at nearly 80% of hospitals globally because of the pandemic, a survey published Wednesday by The Lancet Child & Adolescent Health found.
More than 40% of hospitals surveyed last summer reported that they had made fewer new cancer diagnoses than expected, and about one-third saw a rise in the number of pediatric cancer patients abandoning treatment, the data showed.
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Seven percent of the responding hospitals said they had closed their pediatric cancer units at some point during the pandemic.
NEW DELHI: The COVID-19 pandemic has disrupted paediatric cancer care at about 150 of over 200 hospitals surveyed in a study, published in The Lancet Journal, which calls for better oncology services worldwide to prevent future public health emergencies.
The survey covered 311 healthcare workers at 213 institutions in 79 countries from June 22 to August 21, 2020, and included a range of questions to assess hospital characteristics, the number of patients diagnosed with COVID-19, and disruptions and adaptations to cancer care.
According to the researchers, including Rashmi Dalvi from the Bombay Hospital Institute of Medical Sciences in Mumbai, close to half of the reported hospitals diagnosed fewer new cases of pediatric cancer than expected, while over one third noted a rise in the number of patients who abandoned treatment.