This article provides a review of foreign literature data including a number of aspects that cover guidelines on cancer patient management during the COVID-19 pandemic. The author focuses on the fact that the pandemic has become a serious challenge for the health system not only in the Republic of Belarus, but also has demonstrated a number of problems in the organization of healthcare in most countries of the world. In particular, the pandemic has led to a deteriorated situation with the availability and quality of medical care provided to cancer patients, and periodicals often report a high risk of severe complications in this population group during the spread of COVID-19.
Objective. To study the specificity of the functioning of inpatient healthcare facilities in the Gomel region in the spread of the coronavirus disease COVID-19.Materials and methods. A survey among 78 physicians of the inpatient healthcare facilities was conducted, which provided an opportunity to analyze the specificity of the work in the spread of the coronavirus disease COVID-19 and related difficulties.Results. According to the respondents, in the situation of the COVID-19 pandemic, there has been a considerable growth in working hours and intensity of the work of the physicians in the inpatient healthcare facilities. In the vast majority of the cases (74.7 %), the physicians in the inpatient healthcare facilities underwent training on prevention, diagnostics, adoption of anti-epidemic measures in the detection and treatment of COVID-19 patients. Nevertheless, only 25.6 % of the respondents considered their professional competence level with regard to their work with COVID-19 patients to be high. Moreover, the physicians` satisfaction rate for the existing strategies for rendering medical care to COVID-19 patientswas 6.87 ± 2.06 outof 10.Conclusion. To a large extent, the physicians of inpatient healthcare facilities of the Gomel region during their work with patients are concerned about such circumstances as longer working hours and increased working intensity, complexity of making balanced and optimal decisions regarding the organization of the work of inpatient healthcare facilities during the pandemic, as well as issues related to contact with patients (worrying about getting infected and infecting family, organization of childcare due to the closure of schools and preschool institutions during quarantine and others).
Screening and early diagnosis of cancer have been important components of the comprehensive measures to reduce the incidence and mortality of malignant neoplasms worldwide for quite some time. Despite the widespread use of oncological screening in different countries, doubts persist about its feasibility, methods used, or frequency of examinations. Several studies provide data that oncological screening programs do lead to a reduction in mortality from cancer, but do not reduce overall mortality. The American Society of Clinical Oncology continues to support oncological screening as an effective tool to reduce mortality from malignant neoplasms, but acknowledges that not all individuals who undergo screening will benefit from it, not all individuals with established malignant neoplasms will be cured, and undergoing screening today is not a guarantee of protection against cancer in the future. It is important to note that approaches to screening for malignant neoplasms are dynamically revised as new scientifically substantiated data emerge, and the interpretation by leading groups of experts may differ even within one country. This scientific article presents methods for evaluating the effectiveness of screening programs implementation, such as sensitivity and specificity, ROC analysis, positive and negative predictive value of screening, and results of randomized studies. A brief overview of the main international principles of implementing screening programs and recommendations of international medical communities is provided.
Objective. Conduct a comprehensive assessment of the indicators of screening programs for early detection of breast and cervical cancer in the Gomel region.Materials and methods. A total of 7,611 first-time detected cases of breast cancer and 1,370 cases of cervical cancer in the Gomel region were analyzed for the period 2012-2022 (according to Belarusian Cancer Registry). The results of examination of 105130 participants of the screening program for early detection of breast cancer and 70258 participants of the screening program for early detection of cervical cancer were analyzed.Results. During the period 2017-2022, due to screening, 12% of cases of breast cancer were detected from the total number of newly diagnosed malignant breast pathologies. From 2018 to 2022, the proportion of newly detected cases of cervical cancer within the screening program increased from 0.83% to 2.61%, which indicates that the introduction of the screening program contributes to an increase in the detection of precancerous conditions of the cervix.Conclusions. The screening program for breast cancer and cervical cancer has shown its effectiveness in detecting new cases of malignant neoplasms of these localizations. An important result of the screening conducted in the Gomel region is the fact that the observed trend towards a decrease in the detection of breast cancer and cervical cancer in the early stages does not give any cause for optimism, as this is evidence of a deterioration in the structure of the detected pathology.
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