As the Government’s entire healthcare system is focused on management of Covid-19, non-coronavirus surgical care is now getting the least priority. As many as 5,80,000 planned surgeries here might be cancelled or delayed, according to a study conducted by CovidSurg Collaborative, a research network of over 5,000 surgeons from 120 countries.
The study, led by members based in the UK, Benin, Ghana, India, Italy, Mexico, Nigeria, Rwanda, Spain, South Africa and the US, has been published in the British Journal of Surgery.
“During the COVID-19 pandemic elective surgeries have been cancelled to reduce the risk of patients being exposed to COVID-19 in hospital, and to support the wider hospital response, for example by converting operating theatres in to intensive care units,” said Aneel Bhangu, from the University of Birmingham.
“The risks of exposing patients to perioperative SARS-CoV-2 infection by performing surgery during outbreaks are high, but must be weighed against the risks of protracted treatment delays,” the study states.
“Governments should mitigate against this major burden on patients by developing recovery plans and implementing strategies to safely restore surgical activity.”
The modelling study indicates that each additional week of disruption to hospital services will be associated with a further 2.4 million cancellations.
In a best-case scenario, benign surgeries may be worst hit with 80 per cent (5,05,864) procedures being cancelled or postponed, followed by cancer surgeries (60 per cent or 51,134 procedures) and orthopedics (30 per cent or 27,740 procedures).
The study also estimated a backlog of 5,56,998 surgeries which would take 93 weeks to clear if surgical volume increased by 10 per cent.
The researcher used data from previous studies on elective surgery volumes, and then projected cancellation rates from a response survey with senior surgeons who either estimated best and worst case scenarios or reported the actual figures. Expert responses in India came from Cims Hospital, National Institute of Mental Health & Neurosciences, and Tata Memorial Centre.
“Although essential, cancellations place a heavy burden on patients and society. Patients’ conditions may deteriorate, worsening their quality of life as they wait for rescheduled surgery. In some cases, for example cancer, delayed surgeries may lead to a number of unnecessary deaths,” said Bhangu.
