Impact of the COVID-19 pandemic in nuclear medicine departments: preliminary report of the first international survey

Abstract

Purpose Coronavirus disease-19 (COVID-19) pandemic is challenging the availability of hospital resources worldwide. The Young Group of the Italian Association of Nuclear Medicine (AIMN) developed the first international survey to evaluate the impact of COVID-19 in nuclear medicine (NM). The aim of this study was to perform a preliminary report of the ongoing survey. Methods A questionnaire of thirty questions was prepared for all NM professionals addressing three main issues: (1) new scheduling praxes for NM diagnostic and therapeutic procedures, (2) assistance of patients with diagnosed or suspected COVID-19, and (3) prevention of COVID-19 spreading in the departments. An invitation to the survey was sent to the corresponding authors of NM scientific papers indexed in SCOPUS in 2019. Personal data were analysed per individual responder. Organisation data were evaluated per single department. Results Two-hundred and ninety-six individual responders from 220 departments were evaluated. Most of the responders were from Europe (199/296, 67%). Approximately, all departments already changed their scheduling praxes due to the pandemic (213/ 220, 97%). In most departments, scheduled diagnostic and therapeutic procedures were allowed but quantitatively reduced (112/ 220, 51%). A significant reduction of diagnostic and therapeutic procedures (more than 20%) affected 198/220 (90%) and 158/ 220 (72%) departments, respectively. Incidental COVID-19 signs in NM exams occurred in 106/220 departments (48%). Few departments were closed or shifted to assist patients with 16%). Most of the responders thought that pandemic would not permanently change the work of NM departments in the future (189/296, 64%). Conclusions According to this preliminary report of the first international survey, COVID-19 heavily impacted NM departments and professionals. New praxes for NM procedures, assistance, and prevention of COVID-19 have been applied during the pandemic.Keywords COVID-19 . Nuclear medicine . Survey This article is part of the Topical Collection on Infection and inflammation.

The Coronavirus Disease Pandemic 2019 [COVID-19]: Impact on NHS England PET-CT Scanning 

“…Several surveys have evaluated the impact of COVID-19 on nuclear medicine services [3,4,5,6,7]. All the surveys showed that COVID-19 had resulted in a signi cant decline in nuclear medicine scanning across the world, with some centres experiencing a decrease in activity of up to 85% [7].…”

Surveys on COVID-19 in nuclear medicine: what happened and what we learned

“…During the pandemic, Nuclear Medicine (NM) departments have been involved in several changes and issues, such as new scheduling praxes for NM diagnostic and therapeutic procedures, the assistance of patients with diagnosed or suspected COVID-19, and the prevention of COVID-19 spreading in the departments. For these reasons, some research groups promoted different international surveys to understand the impact of the pandemic on NM departments [ 1 – 3 ].…”

“…The Young Group of the Italian Association of Nuclear Medicine (AIMN) developed the first international survey to evaluate the impact of COVID-19 in NM and performed a preliminary report of the obtained responses [ 1 ]. Two-hundred and ninety-six individual responders from 220 departments were evaluated.…”

“…Only a few departments were closed or shifted to assist patients with COVID-19 (16%). Finally, most of the responders thought that the pandemic would not permanently change the work of NM departments in the future (64%) [ 1 ].…”

“…Nevertheless, some suggestions for future actions could be derived from all these studies as: awareness of the main guidelines for the organization of the departments; scheduling of NM examinations considering urgency and appropriateness criteria; robust screening process as phone or on-site pre-triage; attention to simply rules (also hygienic), as proper distancing and escalation for suspected cases; further investigations for possible indications of NM examinations in the ordinary management of COVID-19 [ 1 ].…”