Our experience with COVID-19 infection in oncology patients

ABSTRACT

Goals SARS-CoV-2 pandemic have a profound effect on the entire oncology community by impacting patients with cancer directly or by delaying or interrupting their specific oncology treatment. Aim of our study was to explore impact of COVID-19 infection on patients with solid tumors. Methods: Between April and December 2020.we collected data from 82 patients that had a COVID-19 infection and were receiving specific oncology treatment trough a Daily chemotherapy hospital at Institute for Oncology and Radiology of Serbia. Data about course of COVID-19 infection were collected as following for patients not treated at the hospital, data were collected in direct contact with patients and available medical documents;for hospitalized patients, data were collected from the medical reports. All of 82 patients had a proven infection by laboratory findings (RT-PCR, antigen or serology test). Demographic data, oncology diagnosis and treatment modality were collected from patients’ electronic records. Results: Out of 82 patients, 72 (88%) are female, and 10 (12%) are male. Patients’ mean age at the time of the COVID-19 diagnosis was 57.3 ± 12.9 years. 35 patients (43%) didn’t have any co-morbidities, 30 of them (37%) had 1 and 17 (20%) had 2 or more co-morbidities requiring active therapy. In our group, 60 patients (73.2%) had nonmetastatic disease and 22 (26.8%) had metastatic disease, out of whom, 10 patients have one organ affected with metastasis and 12 have two or more affected sites. At the time of COVID-19 diagnosed infection, 44 patients (53.7%) was receiving cytotoxic chemotherapy. 33 patients (40.2%) had normal chest X-ray findings and 27 patients (32.9%) had pneumonia. Due to minimal or mild symptoms chest Xray wasn’t done in 22 patients (26.8%). 2 patients (2.4%) died from bilateral pneumonia caused by COVID-19 infection. Both patients were on cytotoxic chemotherapy (Paclitaxel/Capecitabin) in combination with HER2 target therapy. One patient had localy advanced and other had metastatic breast cancer. Out of 80 patients (97.6%) that survived COVID-19 infection, 16 are still recovering.We evaluated 64 patients who recovered from COVID-19 infection. 10 of them (15.6%) had progression of their malignant disease, of whom one patient died. Conclusion(s) Despite the fact that only 2 patients from our group died due to COVID-19 infection, one-third of patients had pneumonia and severe symptoms. We will further evaluate impact of COVID19 infection on their oncology treatment and disease outcome. Conflict of Interest No significant relationships.