Dr. Trinh on the Impact of the COVID-19 Pandemic on Prostate Cancer

Quoc-Dien Trinh, MD, an associate professor of surgery at Harvard Medical School; co-director of the Dana-Farber/Brigham and Women's Prostate Cancer Center; and director of the Ambulatory Clinical Operations in the Division of Urological Surgery at Brigham and Women’s Hospital, discusses the impact of the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic on prostate cancer.

Historically, prostate cancer has been a complex disease, says Trinh​. Moreover, the COVID-19 pandemic has amplified this complexity.

Among patients who are scheduled to undergo surgery, it is necessary to weigh the risks and benefits of the intervention before any final decisions are made, ​Trinh explains.

For example, high-risk patients ​could be offer​ed alternative treatment, such as neoadjuvant androgen deprivation therapy, Trinh concludes.