•  
  •  
 

Subject Area

Clinical Oncology

Article Type

Original Study

Abstract

Objectives To outline the care of oncological emergencies in the emergency room (ER) and its effect on the patient outcomes. Background Care of emergency oncology patients shows many challenges due to symptoms of underlying cancer and toxicities of its treatments. Early recognition of acutely unwell cancer patients is important not only to initiate treatment but also to improve the quality of outcome. Patients and methods This prospective study included 300 adult patients with previous diagnosis of malignant tumors presented to the Emergency Department of Menoufia University Hospital. All patients were classified according to ER triage, primary survey with the airway-breathing-circulation-disability approach, resuscitation, diagnosis, and outcome. Then these data were reported and further assessed. Results Among the 300 adult patients enrolled, the median age was 58 years (range, 20–87). There were 51 patients with repeated visits and with the same symptoms, diagnosis, and ER outcome. There were high significant relations between: triage priority with complaints, critical interventions, and diagnosis. Regarding ER outcome there were high significant relations with complaints, triage priority, and diagnosis, while hospital outcome had significant relations with triage priority, diagnosis, ER outcome, and Multinational Association for Supportive Care in Cancer score. Conclusion Factors that affect ER outcome among cancer patients are cancer type, active cancer treatments, triage complaint, triage priority, and diagnosis. Factors that affect hospital outcome are increased age, active cancer treatment, triage complaint, triage category, diagnosis, and Multinational Association for Supportive Care in Cancer score in neutropenic fever. Older age, palliative treatment, secondary metastasis, neurologic complaints, priority 1 triage category, and disease progression may be predictors for poor ER outcome.

Download

Share

COinS