“…Telehealth is defined by the Telehealth Resource Centre as a collection of means or methods for enhancing the healthcare, public health, and health education delivery and support using telecommunications technologies. 14 , 15 Telehealth in cancer care is not new; it has been effectively used for cancer symptom management, survivorship care, providing remote chemotherapy supervision, palliative care, and psychological support. 2 , 16 , 17 Nonetheless, the social distancing and quarantine requirements instigated to reduce transmission of COVID-19 has led to an unprecedented, rapid and widespread adoption of telehealth technology.…”
Section: Introductionmentioning
confidence: 99%
“… 2 , 16 , 17 Nonetheless, the social distancing and quarantine requirements instigated to reduce transmission of COVID-19 has led to an unprecedented, rapid and widespread adoption of telehealth technology. 15 …”
Objective
This literature review aims to explore the role of telehealth during the COVID-19 pandemic across the interdisciplinary cancer care team.
Data Sources
Electronic databases including CINAHL, MEDLINE, PsychINFO, Scopus, and grey literature were searched using Google Scholar up until September 2020.
Conclusion
While the safe and effective delivery of cancer care via telehealth requires education and training for healthcare professionals and patients, telehealth has provided a timely solution to the barriers caused by the COVID-19 pandemic on the delivery of interdisciplinary cancer services. Globally, evidence has shown that telehealth in cancer care can leverage an innovative response during the COVID-19 pandemic but may provide a long-lasting solution to enable patients to be treated appropriately in their home environment. Telehealth reduces the travel burden on patients for consultation, affords a timely solution to discuss distressing side effects, initiate interventions, and enable possible treatment additions and/or changes.
Implications for Nursing Practice
Global public health disasters pose significant and unique challenges to the provision of necessary services for people affected by cancer. Oncology nurses can provide a central contribution in the delivery of telehealth through transformational leadership across all domains and settings in cancer care. Oncology nurses provide the “hub of cancer care” safely embedded in the interdisciplinary team. Telehealth provides a solution to the current global health crisis but could also benefit the future provision of services and broad reach clinical trials.
“…Telehealth is defined by the Telehealth Resource Centre as a collection of means or methods for enhancing the healthcare, public health, and health education delivery and support using telecommunications technologies. 14 , 15 Telehealth in cancer care is not new; it has been effectively used for cancer symptom management, survivorship care, providing remote chemotherapy supervision, palliative care, and psychological support. 2 , 16 , 17 Nonetheless, the social distancing and quarantine requirements instigated to reduce transmission of COVID-19 has led to an unprecedented, rapid and widespread adoption of telehealth technology.…”
Section: Introductionmentioning
confidence: 99%
“… 2 , 16 , 17 Nonetheless, the social distancing and quarantine requirements instigated to reduce transmission of COVID-19 has led to an unprecedented, rapid and widespread adoption of telehealth technology. 15 …”
Objective
This literature review aims to explore the role of telehealth during the COVID-19 pandemic across the interdisciplinary cancer care team.
Data Sources
Electronic databases including CINAHL, MEDLINE, PsychINFO, Scopus, and grey literature were searched using Google Scholar up until September 2020.
Conclusion
While the safe and effective delivery of cancer care via telehealth requires education and training for healthcare professionals and patients, telehealth has provided a timely solution to the barriers caused by the COVID-19 pandemic on the delivery of interdisciplinary cancer services. Globally, evidence has shown that telehealth in cancer care can leverage an innovative response during the COVID-19 pandemic but may provide a long-lasting solution to enable patients to be treated appropriately in their home environment. Telehealth reduces the travel burden on patients for consultation, affords a timely solution to discuss distressing side effects, initiate interventions, and enable possible treatment additions and/or changes.
Implications for Nursing Practice
Global public health disasters pose significant and unique challenges to the provision of necessary services for people affected by cancer. Oncology nurses can provide a central contribution in the delivery of telehealth through transformational leadership across all domains and settings in cancer care. Oncology nurses provide the “hub of cancer care” safely embedded in the interdisciplinary team. Telehealth provides a solution to the current global health crisis but could also benefit the future provision of services and broad reach clinical trials.
“…We read, with interest, the recent article by Shirke et al [ 1 ] ‘Tele-oncology in the COVID-19 Era: The Way Forward?’, describing the benefits and limitations of tele-oncology and its role during the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic. As medical students experiencing the disruptions caused by COVID-19, this article resonates with us.…”
We read, with interest, the recent article by Shirke et al.[1] 'Tele-oncology in the COVID-19 Era: The Way Forward?', describing the benefits and limitations of tele-oncology and its role during the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic. As medical students experiencing the disruptions caused by COVID-19, this article resonates with us. We appreciate the value of telemedicine in cancer services and agree that tele-oncology offers excellent prospects to help patients with cancer during COVID-19 and in the future. Yet, we are confronted with the fact that there is little mentioned by the authors of the opportunities and challenges associated with integrating telemedicine education and training (ET) in tele-oncology. In response to this statement, here, we set out ways in which telemedicine ET can be integrated in tele-oncology services for medical students. In addition, we discuss challenges of telemedicine ET and propose ways to overcome these.
“… 6 , 9 The 3-tier teleradiotherapy network could be further integrated as a part of teleoncology network and include teleradiodiagnostics, telepathology, tele-education with capacity building, teleconsultation and telefollow-up. 43 , 44 , 45 , 46 This may not only be an effective means to improve cancer care in many countries but may also be cost-effective, economically viable and a convenient means for optimizing cancer care during the present pandemic through maximal resource utilization and cost minimization. Fig.…”
Purpose
There is widespread accord among economists that the COVID-19 pandemic will have a severe negative impact on the global economy. Establishing new radiotherapy (RT) infrastructure may be significantly compromised in the post COVID-19 era. Alternative strategies are needed to improve the existing RT accessibility without significant cost escalation. The outcomes of these approaches on the RT availability has been examined for Asia.
Methods and Materials
The details of RT infrastructures in 2020 for 51 countries in Asia were obtained from the Directory of Radiotherapy Centers of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA). Using the IAEA guidelines, the %RT accessibility and the additional requirements of teletherapy (TRT) units were computed for these countries. To maximize the utilization of the existing RT facilities, five options were evaluated, namely, hypofractionation RT (HFRT) alone, with/without 25% or 50% additional working hours. The impact of these strategies on the %RT access and additional TRT unit requirements to achieve 100% RT access were estimated.
Results
4617 TRT units are available in 46 countries. The mean %RT accessibility is 62.4% in 43 countries (TRT units =4491) where the information on cancer incidence was also available and these would need an additional 6474 TRT units for achieving 100% RT accessibility. By adopting HFRT alone, increasing the working hours by 25% alone, 25% with HFRT, 50% alone and 50% with HFRT; the %RT access could improve to 74.9%, 78%, 90.5%, 93.7% and 106.1% respectively. Correspondingly, the need for additional TRT units would progressively decrease to 4646, 4284, 3073, 2820 and 1958 units.
Conclusion
The economic slowdown in the post Covid-19 period could severely impend establishment of new RT facilities. Thus, maximal utilization of the available RT infrastructure with minimum additional costs could be possible by adopting HFRT with or without increased working hours to improve the RT coverage.
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