Cancer Diagnoses Dropped Sharply During First 10 Months of COVID-19 Pandemic – Renal and Urology News

Cancer diagnoses fell substantially during the first 10 months of the COVID-19 pandemic in the United States, with prostate cancer accounting for the largest number of potentially missed cancers, according to a recent study.

An estimated 134,395 cancer cases went undiagnosed from March 1 through December 31, 2020, corresponding author Krystle A. Lang Kuhs, PhD, MPH, of the University of Kentucky in Lexington, and colleagues reported in JAMA Oncology.

“The findings from this analysis can inform the US health care system as decisions are made to recover the deficit through focused cancer screening and detection,” the authors wrote.

Dr Lang Kuhs and colleagues pointed out that “a decline in new cancer diagnoses in 2020 does not indicate that cancer occurrence in the US decrease, but rather that new cancers were undetected. The longer cancer exists undetected, the greater the risk of tumor progression and the lower the chances of survival and other positive outcomes for patients.”

The study included 1,297,874 cancer cases reported from March 1 through December 31, 2020, with an age-adjusted incidence rate of 326.5 cases per 100,000 population. “To our knowledge, this is the first study to offer a nationwide analysis using US registry data on the cancer case deficit experienced during the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020,” the authors wrote.

Observed rates of cancer at all sites were 13.0% lower than expected based on pre-pandemic rates, according to investigators. During the height of the pandemic from March to May 2020, the observed rates were 28.6% lower than expected. Prostate cancers accounted for the largest number of potentially missed cancers (22,950 cases) during the first 10 months of the pandemic, followed by female breast cancer (16,870 cases) and lung (16,333) cancers.

“From March to May 2020, states with more restrictive COVID-19 responses had significantly greater disruptions [to cancer diagnoses], yet by December 2020, these differences were nonsignificant for all sites except lung, kidney, and pancreatic cancer.”

References:

Burus T, Lei F, Huang B, et al. Undiagnosed cancer cases in the US during the first 10 months of the COVID-19 pandemic. JAMA Oncol. Published online February 22, 2024. doi:10.1001/jamaoncol.2023.6969