Managing low-risk febrile neutropenia in children in the time of COVID-19: What matters to parents and clinicians.
J Paediatr Child Health
; 57(6): 826-834, 2021 06.
Article
em En
| MEDLINE
| ID: mdl-33533525
ABSTRACT
AIM:
The Australian 'There is no place like home' project is implementing a paediatric low-risk febrile neutropenia (FN) programme across eight paediatric hospitals. We sought to identify the impact of the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic on programme implementation.METHODS:
Paediatric oncology, infectious diseases and emergency medicine health-care workers and parent/carers were surveyed to explore the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on home-based FN care. Online surveys were distributed nationally to health-care workers involved in care of children with FN and to parents or carers of children with cancer.RESULTS:
Surveys were completed by 78 health-care workers and 32 parents/carers. Overall, 95% of health-care workers had confidence in the safety of home-based FN care, with 35% reporting changes at their own hospitals in response to the pandemic that made them more comfortable with this model. Compared to pre-pandemic, >50% of parent/carers were now more worried about attending the hospital with their child and >80% were interested in receiving home-based FN care. Among both groups, increased telehealth access and acceptance of home-based care, improved patient quality of life and reduced risk of nosocomial infection were identified as programme enablers, while re-direction of resources due to COVID-19 and challenges in implementing change during a crisis were potential barriers.CONCLUSION:
There is strong clinician and parent/carer support for home-based management of low-risk FN across Australia. Changes made to the delivery of cancer care in response to the pandemic have generally increased acceptance for home-based treatments and opportunities exist to leverage these to refine the low-risk FN programme.Palavras-chave
Texto completo:
1
Coleções:
01-internacional
Base de dados:
MEDLINE
Assunto principal:
Neutropenia Febril
/
COVID-19
Tipo de estudo:
Etiology_studies
/
Risk_factors_studies
Limite:
Child
/
Humans
País/Região como assunto:
Oceania
Idioma:
En
Ano de publicação:
2021
Tipo de documento:
Article