Impact of COVID-19 on cancer care: How the pandemic is delaying cancer diagnosis and treatment for American seniors
Open accessAbstract
PURPOSE: While the immediate care and access disruptions associated with the COVID-19 pandemic have received growing attention in certain areas, the full range of gaps in cancer screenings and treatment is not yet well understood or well documented throughout the country comprehensively. METHODS: This study used a large medical claims clearinghouse database representing 5%-7% of the Medicare fee-for-service population to characterize changes in the utilization of cancer care services and gain insight into the impact of COVID-19 on the US cancer population, including identification of new patients, gaps in access to care, and disruption of treatment journeys. RESULTS: In March-July 2020, in comparison with the baseline period of March-July 2019, there is a substantial decrease in cancer screenings, visits, therapy, and surgeries, with variation by cancer type and site of service. At the peak of the pandemic in April, screenings for breast, colon, prostate, and lung cancers were lower by 85%, 75%, 74%, and 56%, respectively. Significant utilization reductions were observed in April for hospital outpatient evaluation and management (E&M) visits (-74%), new patient E&M visits (-70%), and established patient E&M visits (-60%). A decrease in billing frequency was observed for the top physician-administered oncology products, dropping in both April (-26%) and July (-31%). Mastectomies were reduced consistently in April through July, with colectomies similarly reduced in April and May and prostatectomies dipping in April and July. CONCLUSION: The current impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on cancer care in the United States has resulted in decreases and delays in identifying new cancers and delivery of treatment. These problems, if unmitigated, will increase cancer morbidity and mortality for years to come.
The claims and statistics of this paper haven’t been checked yet.
Run the check — free, no account needed. It reads the open-access text and checks the sources it cites.
Integrity signals
Registry
Cites
Statistics
Claims the paper makes
The claims and statistics of this paper haven’t been checked yet.
Run the check — free, no account needed. It reads the open-access text and checks the sources it cites.
Claims other papers make about this one
Each is checked against this paper’s own text: does it say what the citing paper says it does?
The COVID-19 pandemic has caused significant disruption to the cancer care system, including a shift to virtual appointments, alternative treatment offerings, postponement of surveillance scans and surgeries, and diminished supportive care and survivorship services.
“In addition, the COVID-19 pandemic has caused significant disruption to the cancer care system, including a shift to virtual appointments, alternative treatment offerings, postponement of surveillance scans and surgeries, and diminished supportive care and survivorship services [6,7].”
From The Psychosocial Impact of COVID-19 on Older Adults with Cancer: A Rapid Review (2022) · cites this paper as [6]
The Introduction (page not provided) describes a shift to telehealth, delayed surgeries, and guidance to begin systemic therapy before surgery. The Results and Discussion (page not provided) also document reduced cancer services and follow-up. Our copy does not establish postponement of surveillance scans or diminished supportive care and survivorship services; it describes the alternative treatment sequence as guidance, not a measured change in offerings. (LLM, conf=0.86)
Experimental — accuracy not yet measured
Self-check
Percentages, sums and reported differences re-computed from the paper’s own numbers.
The self-check needs the paper’s full text.
Cites
Maringe, C., Spicer, J. F., Morris, M., Purushotham, A. D., Nolte, E., Sullivan, R. J., Rachet, B., & Aggarwal, A. K. (2020) · The Lancet Oncology · doi:10.1016/s1470-2045(20)30388-0 · Cited by 1,811 · see citing works
Coronavirus disease 2019 case surveillance—United States, January 22–May 30, 2020.
Stokes, E. K., Zambrano, L. D., Anderson, K. N., Marder, E. P., Raz, K. M., El Burai Felix, S., Tie, Y., & Fullerton, K. E. (2020) · MMWR Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report · doi:10.15585/mmwr.mm6924e2 · Cited by 1,538 · see citing works
Al-Shamsi, H. O., Alhazzani, W. A., Alhuraiji, A., Coomes, E. A., Chemaly, R. F., Almuhanna, M., Wolff, R. A., Ibrahim, N. K., Chua, M. L. K., Hotte, S. J., et al. (2020) · The Oncologist · doi:10.1634/theoncologist.2020-0213 · Cited by 690 · see citing works
Kaufman, H. W., Chen, Z., Niles, J. K., et al. (2020) · JAMA Network Open · doi:10.1001/jamanetworkopen.2020.17267 · Cited by 402 · see citing works
The Impact of the COVID-19 Pandemic on Cancer Patients
Al-Quteimat, O. M., & Amer, A. (2020) · American Journal of Clinical Oncology · doi:10.1097/coc.0000000000000712 · Cited by 398 · see citing works
Effects of the COVID-19 Pandemic on Cancer-Related Patient Encounters
London, J., Fazio‐Eynullayeva, E., Palchuk, M. B., Sankey, P., & McNair, C. M. (2020) · JCO Clinical Cancer Informatics · doi:10.1200/cci.20.00068 · Cited by 323 · see citing works
Patient-reported treatment delays in breast cancer care during the COVID-19 pandemic
Papautsky, E. L., & Hamlish, T. (2020) · Breast Cancer Research and Treatment · doi:10.1007/s10549-020-05828-7 · Cited by 240 · see citing works
Disparities in Cancer Prevention in the COVID-19 Era
Carethers, J. M., Sengupta, R., Blakey, R., Ribas, A., & DʼSouza, G. (2020) · Cancer Prevention Research · doi:10.1158/1940-6207.capr-20-0447 · Cited by 111 · see citing works
Forbes, N., Smith, Z. L., Spitzer, R. L., et al. (2020) · Gastroenterology · doi:10.1053/j.gastro.2020.04.071 · Cited by 90 · see citing works
Cancer and COVID-19 — potentially deleterious effects of delaying radiotherapy
Nagar, H., & Formenti, S. C. (2020) · Nature Reviews Clinical Oncology · doi:10.1038/s41571-020-0375-1 · Cited by 79 · see citing works
The Impact of COVID-19 on Radiation Oncology Clinics and Patients With Cancer in the United States
Rivera, A., Ohri, N., Thomas, E. D., Miller, R. C., & Knoll, M. A. (2020) · Advances in Radiation Oncology · doi:10.1016/j.adro.2020.03.006 · Cited by 74 · see citing works
The Paradoxical Effects of COVID-19 on Cancer Care: Current Context and Potential Lasting Impacts
Broom, A. F., Kenny, K., Page, A., Cort, N., Lipp, E., Tan, A. C., Ashley, D. M., Walsh, K. M., & Khasraw, M. (2020) · Clinical Cancer Research · doi:10.1158/1078-0432.ccr-20-2989 · Cited by 54 · see citing works
Fedewa, S. A., Yabroff, K. R., Bandi, P., et al. (2021) · Cancer · doi:10.1002/cncr.33966 · Cited by 29 · see citing works
Epstein, M. M., Sundaresan, D., Fair, M., et al. (2020) · Clinical Cancer Research · doi:10.1158/1557-3265.covid-19-s11-03 · Cited by 3 · see citing works
Fedewa, S. A., Yabroff, K. R., Zheng, Z., et al. (2020) · Clinical Cancer Research · doi:10.1158/1557-3265.covid-19-s09-04 · Cited by 1 · see citing works
Anand, S. R., Walling, A. M., Wenger, N. S., et al. (2020) · Clinical Cancer Research · doi:10.1158/1557-3265.covid-19-po-023 · Cited by 1 · see citing works
Flagged first, then by citations
Cited by
Sorted by citations
Examining the association among fear of COVID‐19, psychological distress, and delays in cancer care
Caston, N. E., Lawhon, V. M., Smith, K. L., Gallagher, K., Angove, R., Anderson, E., Balch, A., Azuero, A., Huang, C. S., & Rocque, G. B. (2021) · Cancer Medicine · doi:10.1002/cam4.4391 · Cited by 56 · see citing works
Johansson, A. L. V., Larønningen, S., Skovlund, C. W., Kristiansen, M. F., Mørch, L. S., Friis, S., Johannesen, T. B., Myklebust, T. Å., Skog, A., Pettersson, D., et al. (2022) · International Journal of Cancer · doi:10.1002/ijc.34029 · Cited by 38 · see citing works
The Psychosocial Impact of COVID-19 on Older Adults with Cancer: A Rapid Review
Verma, R., Kilgour, H. M., & Haase, K. R. (2022) · Current Oncology · doi:10.3390/curroncol29020053 · Cited by 19 · see citing works
“In addition, the COVID-19 pandemic has caused significant disruption to the cancer care system, including a shift to virtual appointments, alternative treatment offerings, postponement of surveillance scans and surgeries, and diminished supportive care and survivorship services [6,7].”
BackgroundThe Needs of Older Adult Cancer Survivors During COVID-19: Implications for Oncology Nursing
Kilgour, H. M., Galica, J., Oliffe, J. L., & Haase, K. R. (2021) · Seminars in Oncology Nursing · doi:10.1016/j.soncn.2021.151229 · Cited by 9 · see citing works
- Authors
- Patt, D., Gordan, L., Diaz, M., Okon, T., Grady, L., Harmison, M., Markward, N., Sullivan, M., Peng, J., & Zhou, A.
- Affiliations
- Texas Oncology (US)
- Florida Cancer Specialists & Research Institute (US)
- Community Oncology Alliance (US)
- Avalere Health, Washington, DC
- Corresponding author
- Patt, Debra
- Venue
- JCO Clinical Cancer Informatics
- Published
- 2020-11
- Volume
- 4
- Issue
- 4
- Pages
- 1059-1071
- ISSN
- 2473-4276 (ISSN-L)
- PMC
- PMC7713534
- OpenAlex
- W3106631792
- Cited by
- 646
- References
- 16
- Citations by year
- 2026: 38 · 2025: 68 · 2024: 82 · 2023: 151 · 2022: 177 · 2021: 127 · 2020: 2
- FWCI
- 41.25
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- hybrid
- doi.org
- Licence
- cc-by-nc-nd
- Locations
- JCO Clinical Cancer Informatics (publishedVersion, cc-by-nc-nd)
- PubMed Central (publishedVersion, cc-by-nc-nd)
- PubMed (publishedVersion)
- Topics
- Health Sciences › Medicine › Oncology › COVID-19 and healthcare impacts
- Health Sciences › Medicine › Oncology › Global Cancer Incidence and Screening
- Social Sciences › Economics, Econometrics and Finance › Economics and Econometrics › COVID-19 Pandemic Impacts
- Keywords
- COVID-19 pandemic, cancer care, cancer screening, delayed cancer diagnosis, cancer treatment disruption, fee-for-service Medicare, older adults, breast cancer, colorectal cancer, prostate cancer, lung cancer, mastectomy, colectomy, prostatectomy, health care access, health insurance claims data
- MeSH terms
- COVID-19, Aged, Female, Medicare, Humans, Male, Medical Oncology, Neoplasms, United States, Early Detection of Cancer, Pandemics
About these checks
Registry, retraction, Cites and statistics results are computed, not judged, with one exception: a printed reference that no index lists is read once by a model before it counts as a citation error. Claims are extracted by a model and kept only when their quote appears verbatim in the text; each cited source is then checked, with a model’s help, for whether it says what the claim relies on. Those verdicts can be wrong — read the claim’s quote and the cited source before relying on one.
Statistics and arithmetic are recomputed, not judged.
Confidence bands are shown only for fields calibrated on our annotated test set. None is calibrated yet, so no band is shown.
What counts as a claim ›How we measure confidence ›How we check this ›
Are you an author, or do you see a problem with this page? Request a review
