Impact of COVID-19 in patients with multiple myeloma based on a global data network - Blood Cancer Journal
Source : https://www.nature.com/articles/s41408-021-00588-z
The COVID-19 pandemic has represented a major cause of morbidity/mortality worldwide, overstressing health systems. Multiple myeloma (MM) patients show an increased risk for infections and they are expected to be particularly vulnerable to SARS-CoV-2 infection.
Conclusion/Relevance: By interrogating large EMR datasets from HCO in Europe and globally, we confirmed that MM patients have been more severely impacted by COVID-19 pandemic than non-MM patients. This study highlights the necessity of extending preventive measures worlwide to protect vulnerable patients from SARS-CoV-2 infection by promoting social distancing and an intensive vaccination strategies.
• Source: Blood Cancer Journal
• Conclusion/Relevance: “By interrogating large EMR datasets from HCO [health-care organizations] in Europe and globally, we confirmed that MM patients have been more severely impacted by COVID-19 pandemic than non-MM patients. This study highlights the necessity of extending preventive measures worldwide to protect vulnerable patients from SARS-CoV-2 infection by promoting social distancing and an intensive vaccination strategies.”
• Via propensity score matched analyses, investigators found that in 2020 vs 2019, the number of new MM diagnoses dropped, and the survival of newly diagnosed patients dropped in a similar fashion. When compared with non-MM patients, MM patients were more prone to COVID infection, and they experienced higher excess mortality.
• “The COVID-19 pandemic has overloaded our health systems globally; this resulted in a lack of attention to other pathologies that require very specialized diagnostic and therapeutic tools,” wrote the authors.
• A strength of the study was the validation of results using three different data networks from across the world; these data networks offered powerful and consistent data for outcomes. Limitations of the current study include possible data entry errors and gaps in EMR. In some cases, some data had to be inferred such as actual date of MM diagnosis. Mortality data could also be incomplete or delayed.