Impact of COVID-19 on the time to counseling and treatment of prostate cancer

Abstract

Purpose

This study investigates how the COVID-19 pandemic (CP) impacted the timeline between initial diagnosis (ID) of prostate carcinoma and subsequent therapy consultation (TC) or radical prostatectomy (RP) due to the implementation of a “minimal contact concept,” which postponed clinical examinations until the day of admission.

Methods

We analyzed patient data from a tertiary care center from 2018 to September 2021. The focus was on comparing the time intervals from ID to TC and from ID to RP before and during the CP.

Results

Of 12,255 patients, 6,073 (61.6%) were treated before and 3,791 (38.4%) during the CP. The median time from ID to TC reduced from 37 days (IQR: 21 – 58d) pre-CP to 32 days (IQR: 20 – 50d) during CP (p < 0.001). Similarly, the time from ID to RP decreased from 98 days (IQR: 70 – 141d) to 75 days (IQR: 55 – 108d; p < 0.001) during the CP. There was a significant decrease in low-risk tumor cases at ID (18.9% vs. 21.4%; p = 0.003) and post-RP (4% vs. 6.7%; p < 0.001) during the CP.

Conclusion

Our findings suggest that the COVID-19 pandemic facilitated more timely treatment of prostate cancer, suggesting potential benefits for both low-risk and aggressive tumor management through expedited clinical procedures.

Keywords:

• prostatic neoplasms
• time-to-treatment
• COVID-19
• counseling
• radical prostatectomy
• patient care management
• health services accessibility
• pandemics

Compliance with ethical standards

Disclosure of potential conflict of interest: The authors declare that they have no conflict of interest related to this work. In accordance with federal and institutional guidelines, all men signed an institutional review board-approved, protocol-specific informed consent form before study entry. The study was performed in accordance with the ethical standards as laid down in the 1964 Declaration of Helsinki and its later amendments or comparable ethical standards. Anonymized data were used.

Informed consent

All patients agreed on prospective data collection by informed consent.

Research involving human participants and/or animals

This study did not involve human or animal subjects. Data was collected prospectively.

Acknowledgments

There was no external financial support for this study.

Author contributions

DKF: Protocol/project development, Data analysis, Data collection or management, Manuscript writing/editing, Data analysis. RMP: Protocol/project development, Data analysis, Manuscript writing/editing, Data analysis. PM: Data collection or management, Data analysis, Manuscript writing/editing. PT: Data analysis, Data collection or management, Data analysis. BB: Data analysis, Manuscript writing/editing. DT: Protocol/project development, Manuscript writing/editing, Data analysis. HI: Data collection or management, Manuscript writing/editing. TM: Manuscript writing/editing. TAL: Manuscript writing/editing. HH: Manuscript writing/editing. TS: Protocol/project development, Manuscript writing/editing.

Disclosure statement

No potential competing interest was reported by the authors.

Additional information

Funding

The author(s) reported there is no funding associated with the work featured in this article.