If someone is found to have cancer, he emphasized, “There’s no reason to delay treatment. If a woman has cancer in a breast, it needs to be removed, and she should go to a hospital where she can be treated safely.”
Dr. David E. Cohn, chief medical officer at The Ohio State University Comprehensive Cancer Center, said that in the early months of the pandemic “we experienced a significant decline in new patients. Even some patients with symptoms were afraid to come in or couldn’t even see their doctors because the offices were closed. This could result in a delayed diagnosis, more complex care and potentially a worse outcome.”
But he said his center has since returned to baseline, suggesting that, despite the fall’s surge in Covid-19 cases, few cancer patients now remain undiagnosed and untreated.
“We made creative adaptations to Covid” to maximize patient safety, Dr. Cohn said in an interview. “For certain cancers, instead of doing surgery upfront, we treated patients with radiation and chemotherapy first, then did surgery later” when there was less stress on hospital facilities and personnel and patients could be better protected against the virus.
The Coronavirus Outbreak ›
Words to Know About Testing
Confused by the terms about coronavirus testing? Let us help:
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- Antibody: A protein produced by the immune system that can recognize and attach precisely to specific kinds of viruses, bacteria, or other invaders.
- Antibody test/serology test: A test that detects antibodies specific to the coronavirus. Antibodies begin to appear in the blood about a week after the coronavirus has infected the body. Because antibodies take so long to develop, an antibody test can’t reliably diagnose an ongoing infection. But it can identify people who have been exposed to the coronavirus in the past.
- Antigen test: This test detects bits of coronavirus proteins called antigens. Antigen tests are fast, taking as little as five minutes, but are less accurate than tests that detect genetic material from the virus.
- Coronavirus: Any virus that belongs to the Orthocoronavirinae family of viruses. The coronavirus that causes Covid-19 is known as SARS-CoV-2.
- Covid-19: The disease caused by the new coronavirus. The name is short for coronavirus disease 2019.
- Isolation and quarantine: Isolation is the separation of people who know they are sick with a contagious disease from those who are not sick. Quarantine refers to restricting the movement of people who have been exposed to a virus.
- Nasopharyngeal swab: A long, flexible stick, tipped with a soft swab, that is inserted deep into the nose to get samples from the space where the nasal cavity meets the throat. Samples for coronavirus tests can also be collected with swabs that do not go as deep into the nose — sometimes called nasal swabs — or oral or throat swabs.
- Polymerase Chain Reaction (PCR): Scientists use PCR to make millions of copies of genetic material in a sample. Tests that use PCR enable researchers to detect the coronavirus even when it is scarce.
- Viral load: The amount of virus in a person’s body. In people infected by the coronavirus, the viral load may peak before they start to show symptoms, if symptoms appear at all.
Dr. Cohn said that certain kinds of supportive care can be delivered remotely to cancer patients and their families — even genetic counseling, if a DNA sample is sent in. However, he added, “the majority of cancer treatment has to be administered in person, and surveillance of cancer patients is best done in face-to-face visits.”
Now with the virus surging around the country, many medical centers may be forced to again limit elective procedures, those not deemed urgent. But, Dr. Sleckman said, “Cancer treatment is not elective — it’s urgent and should not be delayed.”
Learning that one has cancer, even when it is early and potentially highly curable, is likely to strain a person’s ability to cope with adversity, all the more so when the diagnosis occurs in the midst of an already highly stressful and frightening pandemic.