Major surgery in an osteosarcoma patient refusing blood transfusion: case report

Abstract

We describe an unusual case of osteosarcoma in a Jehovah's Witness patient who underwent chemotherapy and major surgery without the need for blood transfusion. This 16-year-old girl presented with osteosarcoma of the right proximal tibia requiring proximal tibia resection, followed by endoprosthesis replacement. She was successfully treated with neoadjuvant chemotherapy and surgery with the support of haematinics, granulocyte colony-stimulating factor, recombinant erythropoietin and intraoperative normovolaemic haemodilution. This case illustrates the importance of maintaining effective, open communication and exploring acceptable therapeutic alternative in the management of these patients, whilst still respecting their beliefs.

Profile of scientific production on religiosity and spirituality in coping with childhood cancer

“…In the present corpus, one article was published in 2009 (Juvakka & Kylm, 2009), three in 2010 (i.e. Dhanoa et al, 2010;Kamper et al, 2010), two in 2011 (Paisley et al, 2011;Wilson et al, 2011), one in 2012 (Klepping, 2012), one in 2013 (De Vries et al, 2013), four in 2014(i.e. Lyon et al, 2014Revuelta-Iniesta et al, 2014), six in 2015(i.e.…”

“…Darby et al, 2014;Klepping, 2012). Authors from institutions in Singapore (Pravin et al, 2019), Indonesia (Lina Mahayati et al, 2018), Malaysia (Dhanoa et al, 2010), Finland (Juvakka & Kylm, 2009), the Netherlands (De Vries et al, 2013), Greece (Pourtsidis et al, 2015), and Lebanon (Al-Gharib et al, 2015) had only one production each. Selected for full reading (n = 195) LILACS (n=7); PubMed (n=70); PsycINFO (n=24); SciELO (n=8); CINAHL (n=86).…”

“…Darby et al, 2014;De Vries et al, 2013); nine focused on adolescents (i.e. Dhanoa et al, 2010;Lina Mahayati et al, 2018); one focused on teenagers and family (Lyon et al, 2014); five had adolescents and young adults (i.e. Barton et al, 2018;Revuelta-Iniesta et al, 2014); one focused on children, adolescents, and family members (Al-Gharib et al, 2015); one had adolescent and adult participants (Ahmadi et al, 2018); and one had adolescents and health professionals.…”

“…Among the nine who presented the R/S of the participants, it was possible to observe people who declared themselves to be Christian, Catholic, Jehovah's Witness, Taoist, Sikh, Open Mind, Islamic, Jewish, Atheist, Hindu, and Spiritual People, among others (i.e. Barton et al, 2018;Cheng et al, 2016;Darby et al, 2014;Dhanoa et al, 2010;Klepping, 2012;Moore et al, 2020).…”

A case of thoracic esophageal cancer undergone esophagectomy after induction chemotherapy in a Jehovah's Witness

“…No reports of esophageal resection following neoadjuvant chemotherapy were found. But we found the reports of other cancers in which anemia and thrombocytopenia were problems related to neoadjuvant chemotherapy (13,14). The patients in these reports also underwent blood-forming therapy, and surgery was performed by combining PCS with ANH.…”