10 Suggestions for Improving Cancer Care in Light of COVID-19

COVID-19 caused by the novel coronavirus and the global pandemic we are experiencing mean that healthcare—including oncology—will never be the same. Every medical specialty needs new ways of understanding technological innovations (for example, wider use of telemedicine), new scientific research, the flow of information and emotional pressures.

The Impact of Difficult Times

Experiences with COVID-19 treatment shared from China, Spain, Italy and Turkey have made us question the value of everything amid this outbreak and changed our perceptions. COVID-19 treatment experiments and the use of unproven practices without approval have also challenged how we view scientific evidence. Based on these uncertain, difficult times and the experiences of colleagues worldwide, we present 10 changes that we hope will become principles of oncology practice during and after COVID-19:

1. For our patients and ourselves, we should prioritize work-life balance. This should be a top priority for doctors and all working people.
2. Doctors should increase face-to-face interactions with patients. During the pandemic, hands-on physical examinations may be skipped; see patients, talk to them and listen. Use technology when circumstances require it (for example, telemedicine), but generally focus on face-to-face visits.
3. Scientific evidence, often perceived as "rigid" by patients, should continue to be analyzed carefully. In doing so, however, patients should be considered as whole people, including their social environment, culture, psychology and other wishes regarding treatment.
4. Medical waste and the frequency of hospital visits should be reduced by selecting appropriate treatment protocols. Once-monthly doses of many immunotherapies have already received FDA approval.
5. Prioritization workflows should be used to clarify expectations and reduce stress.
6. Treatment effectiveness depends on many factors, including different forms of drug resistance arising from biological differences between tumors, as well as nonmedical factors. We should therefore avoid the trap of therapeutic illusion, the belief that medical interventions are more effective than they actually are.
7. We should talk more with colleagues, not only to share and learn medical concepts but also to improve collaboration and appreciate the many remarkable people around us. This should also be part of our motivation for attending medical conferences in the future.
8. To simplify practice, reduce doctors’ administrative workload and improve interactions with colleagues, cognitive health technologies / medical informatics solutions should be designed (for example, electronic patient-reported outcomes).
9. Doctors should think beyond simply recording standard patient data and disease outcomes. Alongside traditional measures, indicators such as quality of life, well-being and treatment satisfaction—for patients and even healthcare workers—should be measured through descriptive data.
10. We should recognize that every patient and colleague is unique and exceptional. Each day we return to our families, we should be grateful for another day of life. Today we leave our shoes and medical clothing at the entrance to our homes; tomorrow we will leave behind bad memories, daily fatigue and negative energy to become better people and therefore better oncologists.

Final Words

In these partly uncertain and difficult days, oncology professionals should come together and develop strategies to keep providing high-quality patient care regardless of the pandemic. We will strive to meet these expectations and strengthen communication with colleagues to maximize the quality of cancer care after COVID-19.

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