David W. Dougherty, MD

David W. Dougherty, MD, a medical oncologist at the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute and assistant professor of medicine at Harvard Medical School, discusses how cancer centers can move forward following the negative effects caused by the COVID-19 pandemic.

Dougherty says the most important next step in mitigating the impact of the pandemic is to urge patients to stop deferring in-person care that could improve their survival outcomes and quality of life. He also acknowledges that organizations have been hurt financially, but they can work to provide the same level of care with limited resources by improving efficiency.

Overall, providing access to the same care as before COVID while maintaining safety for patients will provide the best possible outcomes for patients and support for their families.

 First and foremost, organizations need to be proactively communicating with patients about the importance of getting care that may have been deferred as a result of the pandemic. I think organizations need to continue their austerity measures to make sure that they're making good investments in their resources to be able to mitigate the financial impact in the longer term. And I think, again, [as] organizations, we need to continue to remain as efficient as possible with what we're doing with patients to continue to mitigate those downsides. And really, as quickly as possible, get patients and families back in person as safely as we can and really get at the experience of the cancer journey, and getting back to that aspect of where we were pre-COVID.

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David W. Dougherty, MD, discusses how cancer centers can move forward following the negative effects caused by the COVID-19 pandemic.

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