Dados do Trabalho

Título

TIME TO START THE BREAST CANCER TREATMENT IN THE YEAR OF THE COVID-19 PANDEMIC IN BRAZIL

Introdução

Since December 2019, the advent of the new Coronavirus pandemic (SARS-CoV-2) has created a challenging healthcare scenario. In an attempt to contain a rapid curve of virus spread, health services postponed or canceled elective procedures and vehemently adopted telemedicine. In this context, women with breast cancer started to face barriers regarding the execution of treatment and early diagnosis of suspected cases. Besides, the delay in identifying cancer, and obstacles to initiate and continue cancer treatment, have negative impacts on the prognosis of the disease.

Objetivo

Characterize the time until the start of treatment and the epidemiology related to breast cancer in Brazil; during the year 2020.

Método

Ecological study using clinical and epidemiological data on breast cancer in Brazil, in 2020, from the Database of the Information Technology Department of the Unified Health System (DATASUS). It analyzes the timespan from diagnosis to treatment, how the treatment started, and clinical and epidemiological variables.

Resultado

Upon analysis, there were 44,007 breast cancer cases on treatment in Brazil in 2020, 95% of which were malignant breast cancer and 5% in situ breast cancer. In this sense, regarding the waiting time until the start of treatment, most (32.7%) had a period longer than two months; 13.6% of the time, the wait lasted from 61 to 90 days. About the disease's stage, the majority (21%) were in stage 3. The state with the highest number of patients waiting for treatment is São Paulo, with 18% of the total. Concerning the age group of patients, 13.2% were between 55 and 59 years old. Furthermore, the research showed that treatment of 56.5% of cases with chemotherapy alone.

Conclusão

Finally, most cases treated were breast invasive malignant neoplasms, mainly stage 3, largely present in the state of São Paulo with a waiting period possibly longer than 60 days for onset treatment, the most common of which was chemotherapy.

Palavras-chave

Breast Neoplasms; Health Services Accessibility; COVID-19

Área

Oncologia - Tumores de Mama