Will patients who receive radiation to a large mediastinal nodal field have an increased susceptibility to COVID-19?
If so, for how long would you expect this increased susceptibility to last? Our medical oncologists often tell patients that their lymphocyte counts may be compromised for up to 6 months after chemotherapy and therefore may be at increased risk for viral infections during that time.
Answer from: Radiation Oncologist at Academic Institution
While the actual infection of COVID-19 has more to do with hygiene, social distancing, and prevention such as drugs or vaccines, the susceptibility for the patient to develop symptomatic progression of COVID-19, once infected, has a strong theoretical possibility. The factors that impact severe lymp...
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Answer from: Radiation Oncologist at Academic Institution
"May you live in interesting times" (purported Chinese curse). Right now we are adding a new element to our thoughts on therapeutic ratio for patients. This will depend on so many variables including patient age, her/his underlying comorbidities, the density of COVID infections in your city, the sta...
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Radiation Oncologist at University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center
The available literature which has documented ALC ...
The available literature which has documented ALC ...
Radiation Oncologist at Yale School of Medicine
@Puneeth Iyengar, can you share your observations ...
@Puneeth Iyengar, can you share your observations ...
Answer from: Radiation Oncologist at Community Practice
Both large and even quite small XRT fields, and volumetric arcs as well, produce reduction in peripheral lymphocyte count. We all learned that radiotherapy “immunosuppressive.” Without definitive evidence, we assume these two observations are related. Are they? I don’t know. At the...