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Severity of COVID-19 in patients with lung cancer: evidence and challenges

Cancer patients are highly vulnerable to SARS-CoV-2 infections due to frequent contacts with the healthcare system, immunocompromised state from cancer or its therapies, supportive medications such as steroids and most importantly their advanced age and comorbidities. Patients with lung cancer have...

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Autores principales: Passaro, Antonio, Bestvina, Christine, Velez Velez, Maria, Garassino, Marina Chiara, Garon, Edward, Peters, Solange
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: BMJ Publishing Group 2021
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7978268/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/33737345
http://dx.doi.org/10.1136/jitc-2020-002266
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author Passaro, Antonio
Bestvina, Christine
Velez Velez, Maria
Garassino, Marina Chiara
Garon, Edward
Peters, Solange
author_facet Passaro, Antonio
Bestvina, Christine
Velez Velez, Maria
Garassino, Marina Chiara
Garon, Edward
Peters, Solange
author_sort Passaro, Antonio
collection PubMed
description Cancer patients are highly vulnerable to SARS-CoV-2 infections due to frequent contacts with the healthcare system, immunocompromised state from cancer or its therapies, supportive medications such as steroids and most importantly their advanced age and comorbidities. Patients with lung cancer have consistently been reported to suffer from an increased risk of death compared with other cancers. This is possibly due to the combination of specific pathophysiological aspects, including underlying pulmonary compromise due to smoking history and the increased specific pressures on respiratory healthcare services caused by the related pandemic. Rationally and safely treating patients with lung cancer during the pandemic has become a continuous challenge over the last year. Deciding whether to offer, modify, postpone or even cancel treatments for this particular patient’s population has become the crucial recurrent dilemma for lung cancer professionals. Chemotherapy, immunotherapy and targeted agents represent distinct risks factors in the context of COVID-19 that should be balanced with the short-term and long-term consequences of delaying cancer care. Despite the rapid and persistent trend of the pandemic, declared by WHO on March 11, 2020, and still ongoing at the time of writing (January 2021), various efforts were made by oncologists worldwide to understand the impact of COVID-19 on patients with cancer. Adapted recommendations of our evidence-based practice guidelines have been developed for all stakeholders. Different small and large-scale registries, such as the COVID-19 and Cancer Consortium (CCC19) and Thoracic Cancers International COVID-19 Collaboration quickly collected data, supporting cancer care decisions under the challenging circumstance created by the COVID-19 pandemic. Several recommendations were developed as guidance for prioritizing the various aspects of lung cancer care in order to mitigate the adverse effects of the COVID-19 healthcare crisis, potentially reducing the morbidity and mortality of our patients from COVID-19 and from cancer. These recommendations helped inform decisions about treatment of established disease, continuation of clinical research and lung cancer screening. In this review, we summarize available evidence regarding the direct and indirect impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on lung cancer care and patients.
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spelling pubmed-79782682021-03-30 Severity of COVID-19 in patients with lung cancer: evidence and challenges Passaro, Antonio Bestvina, Christine Velez Velez, Maria Garassino, Marina Chiara Garon, Edward Peters, Solange J Immunother Cancer Review Cancer patients are highly vulnerable to SARS-CoV-2 infections due to frequent contacts with the healthcare system, immunocompromised state from cancer or its therapies, supportive medications such as steroids and most importantly their advanced age and comorbidities. Patients with lung cancer have consistently been reported to suffer from an increased risk of death compared with other cancers. This is possibly due to the combination of specific pathophysiological aspects, including underlying pulmonary compromise due to smoking history and the increased specific pressures on respiratory healthcare services caused by the related pandemic. Rationally and safely treating patients with lung cancer during the pandemic has become a continuous challenge over the last year. Deciding whether to offer, modify, postpone or even cancel treatments for this particular patient’s population has become the crucial recurrent dilemma for lung cancer professionals. Chemotherapy, immunotherapy and targeted agents represent distinct risks factors in the context of COVID-19 that should be balanced with the short-term and long-term consequences of delaying cancer care. Despite the rapid and persistent trend of the pandemic, declared by WHO on March 11, 2020, and still ongoing at the time of writing (January 2021), various efforts were made by oncologists worldwide to understand the impact of COVID-19 on patients with cancer. Adapted recommendations of our evidence-based practice guidelines have been developed for all stakeholders. Different small and large-scale registries, such as the COVID-19 and Cancer Consortium (CCC19) and Thoracic Cancers International COVID-19 Collaboration quickly collected data, supporting cancer care decisions under the challenging circumstance created by the COVID-19 pandemic. Several recommendations were developed as guidance for prioritizing the various aspects of lung cancer care in order to mitigate the adverse effects of the COVID-19 healthcare crisis, potentially reducing the morbidity and mortality of our patients from COVID-19 and from cancer. These recommendations helped inform decisions about treatment of established disease, continuation of clinical research and lung cancer screening. In this review, we summarize available evidence regarding the direct and indirect impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on lung cancer care and patients. BMJ Publishing Group 2021-03-18 /pmc/articles/PMC7978268/ /pubmed/33737345 http://dx.doi.org/10.1136/jitc-2020-002266 Text en © Author(s) (or their employer(s)) 2021. Re-use permitted under CC BY-NC. No commercial re-use. See rights and permissions. Published by BMJ. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/This is an open access article distributed in accordance with the Creative Commons Attribution Non Commercial (CC BY-NC 4.0) license, which permits others to distribute, remix, adapt, build upon this work non-commercially, and license their derivative works on different terms, provided the original work is properly cited, appropriate credit is given, any changes made indicated, and the use is non-commercial. See http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/.
spellingShingle Review
Passaro, Antonio
Bestvina, Christine
Velez Velez, Maria
Garassino, Marina Chiara
Garon, Edward
Peters, Solange
Severity of COVID-19 in patients with lung cancer: evidence and challenges
title Severity of COVID-19 in patients with lung cancer: evidence and challenges
title_full Severity of COVID-19 in patients with lung cancer: evidence and challenges
title_fullStr Severity of COVID-19 in patients with lung cancer: evidence and challenges
title_full_unstemmed Severity of COVID-19 in patients with lung cancer: evidence and challenges
title_short Severity of COVID-19 in patients with lung cancer: evidence and challenges
title_sort severity of covid-19 in patients with lung cancer: evidence and challenges
topic Review
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7978268/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/33737345
http://dx.doi.org/10.1136/jitc-2020-002266
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