University of Twente Student Theses
The impact of COVID-19 on treatment, use of expensive medications and treatment delays of patients with de novo metastatic cancer
Weijzen, Feike (2022) The impact of COVID-19 on treatment, use of expensive medications and treatment delays of patients with de novo metastatic cancer.
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| Abstract: | Introduction: The COVID-19 pandemic had an impact on cancer care around the world. The first confirmed COVID-19 infection in the Netherlands was on February 27, 2020. Recommendations were made on how to manage cancer care during the pandemic. This study aims to investigate the impact of the pandemic on patients with de novo metastatic cancer. Methods: Patients who were diagnosed with de novo metastatic cancer between January 2017 and May 2021 were included and divided into different periods depending on the severity of the pandemic. The percentage of patients that received a certain treatment or expensive medication within the same period they were diagnosed in, was compared between the years 2020/2021 and the years 2017-2019 with a Chi-squared test and a logistic regression. For the expensive medication the moving average over the last four weeks during 2020 was plotted. Average time between the diagnosis and the initial treatment was analyzed with a Mann Whitney test. Results: In total, 63,731 patients were included from the Dutch Cancer registry and the Dutch Hospital Data. Slight changes were found regarding the percentage of patients that received a certain treatment. Less surgeries were given in the periods after the initial peak in hospital admissions. A rise of 4.34% was found in the percentage of patients that received chemotherapy in the first weeks of 2021. The odds ratio of receiving surgery for patients with metastatic breast cancer after the initial first peak in hospital admissions was 0.31 (0.12-0.79). A small peak could be seen in the moving average plot in the amount of expensive cytotoxic medication given in period C. Average time between diagnosis and initial treatment decreased with nearly 4.5 days during the initial peak in hospital admissions. Conclusion: Despite the disruptive impact, the COVID-19 pandemic had on cancer care worldwide, the impact on treatments for patients with de novo metastatic cancer care in the Netherlands was limited and not only negative, for example the time to treatment decreased. |
| Item Type: | Essay (Master) |
| Faculty: | TNW: Science and Technology |
| Subject: | 44 medicine |
| Programme: | Health Sciences MSc (66851) |
| Link to this item: | https://purl.utwente.nl/essays/92283 |
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