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THURSDAY, July 30, 2020 (HealthDay News)<\/p>\n
Despite rampant fears that cancer<\/a> patients are at higher risk of having severe cases of COVID-19<\/a>, a new study suggests gynecologic cancers<\/a> do not boost the chances of hospitalization or death.<\/p>\n “Our study should be reassuring for women with gynecologic cancers<\/a> who are worried that having cancer<\/a> increases their risk of becoming seriously ill if they go to the hospital because of COVID-19<\/a>,” said lead investigator Olivia Lara, an oncology<\/a> fellow at NYU Langone’s Perlmutter Cancer<\/a> Center.<\/p>\n For the study, Lara’s team reviewed the medical records of 121 women, aged 51 to 63, being treated simultaneously for gynecologic cancers and COVID-19<\/a> in New York City between March and April.<\/p>\n The results, published online July 31 in the journal Cancer<\/a><\/i>, revealed that these women had similar hospitalization rates and death as those who only had COVID-19<\/a>.<\/p>\n More than half of the study patients required hospitalization, and among those hospitalized one-quarter died, amounting to a 14% death rate.<\/p>\n The death rate among this sample is comparable to the 21% death rate identified in another study, which included 5,700 hospitalized COVID-19<\/a> patients in the city, the study authors noted.<\/p>\n The study could potentially alter the theory that cancer<\/a> patients face worse odds when infected with COVID-19<\/a>.<\/p>\n A full 75% of the women with gynecological cancer<\/a> experienced only a mild form of the disease, according to the report.<\/p>\n The women’s risk of dying from COVID-19 did not increase even if they had late-stage cancer, cancer surgery or high-dose chemotherapy<\/a>, the study authors said in a New York University news release.<\/p>\n Still, one risk factor related to cancer treatment seemed to increase the odds of death.<\/p>\n Women receiving immunotherapy — treatment that uses a person’s own immune system to fight cancer — were three times more likely to die than women who received standard cancer treatments such as radiation<\/a>, surgery or chemotherapy<\/a>.<\/p>\n But only eight out of the 121 participants included in the study were treated with immunotherapy, prompting the study authors to stress<\/a> that the sample was too small to make any conclusions based on this finding.<\/p>\n The results do underscore the importance of receiving cancer screenings and treatments, despite COVID-19 fears.<\/p>\n
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