Oncology during the COVID‑19 pandemic: challenges, dilemmas and the psychosocial impact on cancer patients (Review)
Konstantinos Tsamakis, Maria Gavriatopoulou, Dimitriοs Schizas, Athina Stravodimou, Aikaterini Mougkou, Dimitrios Tsiptsios, Vasileios Sioulas, Eleftherios Spartalis, Athanasios D. Sioulas, Charalampos Tsamakis, Nikolaos Charalampakis, Christoph Mueller, Donna Arya, Paul Zarogoulidis, Demetrios�� Spandidos, Meletios Α. Dimopoulos, Charalabos Papageorgiou, Emmanouil Rizos
Abstract
COVID-19 has caused unprecedented societal turmoil, triggering a rapid, still ongoing, transformation of healthcare provision on a global level. In this new landscape, it is highly important to acknowledge the challenges this pandemic poses on the care of the particularly vulnerable cancer patients and the subsequent psychosocial impact on them. We have outlined our clinical experience in managing patients with gastrointestinal, hematological, gynaecological, dermatological, neurological, thyroid, lung and paediatric cancers in the COVID-19 era and have reviewed the emerging literature around barriers to care of oncology patients and how this crisis affects them. Moreover, evolving treatment strategies and novel ways of addressing the needs of oncology patients in the new context of the pandemic are discussed.