The global COVID-2019 pandemic has presented to the field of radiation oncology a management dilemma in providing evidence-based treatments to all cancer patients. There is a need for appropriate measures to be taken to reduce infectious spread between the medical healthcare providers and the patient population. Such times warrant resource prioritization and to continue treatment with best available evidence, thereby reducing the risk of COVID-2019 transmission in times where the workforce is reduced. There has been literature presented in different aspects related to providing safety measures, running of a radiation department and for the management of various cancer subsites. In this article, we present a comprehensive review for sustaining a radiation oncology department in times of the COVID-2019 pandemic.
Introduction:
COVID-19 illness caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome-coronavirus-2 (SARS-CoV-2) virus has been declared a pandemic by the World Health Organization in March 2020. It had an overwhelming effect on health-care delivery in India. We report the 5 months, April–September 2020, experience in our radiotherapy (RT) department.
Methods:
Since April–September 2020, we registered 184 cancer patients with various site diseases for RT/chemoradiation treatment for curative/palliative therapy. Preregistration and weekly once during treatment period all underwent throat/nasopharynx swab testing with reverse transcription polymerase chain reaction. Dedicated infection prophylaxis was carried for patients and staff.
Results:
Of the 184 patients, 10.9% (20/184) swab results were positive for SARS-CoV-2. With appropriate COVID-19 care and quarantine, 18 patients completed the planned RT. Two died with COVID-19 infection illness and progressive locoregional cancer. We observed no excess acute RT/chemoradiation effects in this group due to infection.
Conclusions:
Our 5-month experience in this COVID-19 pandemic period reveals that RT treatment, COVID-19 care, and quarantine can be done with dedicated infection protective measures.
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