BARCELONA – The typical lag between treatment initiation with selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors (SSRIs) for depression and enhanced mood may be because of the time it takes to increase brain synaptic density, new imaging data suggest.

In a double-blind study, more than 30 volunteers were randomly assigned to the SSRI escitalopram or placebo for 3-5 weeks. Using PET imaging, the investigators found that over time, synaptic density significantly increased significantly in the neocortex and hippocampus but only in patients taking the active drug.

The results point to two conclusions, said study investigator Gitta Moos Knudsen, MD, PhD, clinical professor and chief physician at the department of clinical medicine, neurology, psychiatry and sensory sciences at Copenhagen (Denmark) University Hospital.

First, they indicate that SSRIs increase synaptic density in brain areas critically involved in depression, a finding that would go some way to indicating that the synaptic density in the brain may be involved in how antidepressants function, “which would give us a target for developing novel drugs against depression,” said Dr. Knudsen.

“Secondly, our data suggest synapses build up over a period of weeks, which would explain why the effects of these drugs take time to kick in,” she added.

The findings were presented at the 36th European College of Neuropsychopharmacology (ECNP) Congress and simultaneously published online in Molecular Psychiatry.
 

Marked increase in synaptic density

SSRIs are widely used for depression as well as anxiety and obsessive-compulsive disorder. It is thought that they act via neuroplasticity and synaptic remodeling to improve cognition and emotion processing. However, the investigators note clinical evidence is lacking.

For the study, the researchers randomly assigned healthy individuals to either 20-mg escitalopram or placebo for 3-5 weeks.

They performed PET with the 11C-UCB-J tracer, which allows imaging of the synaptic vesicle glycoprotein 2A (SV2A) in the brain, synaptic density, as well as changes in density over time, in the hippocampus and neocortex.

Between May 2020 and October 2021, 17 individuals were assigned to escitalopram and 15 to placebo. There were no significant differences between two groups in terms of age, sex, and PET-related variables. Serum escitalopram measurements confirmed that all participants in the active drug group were compliant.

When synaptic density was assessed at a single time point, an average of 29 days after the intervention, there were no significant differences between the escitalopram and placebo groups in either the neocortex (P = .41) or in the hippocampus (P = .26).

However, when they performed a secondary analysis of the time-dependent effect on SV2A levels, they found a marked difference between the two study groups.

Compared with the placebo group, participants taking escitalopram had a marked increase in synaptic density in both the neocortex (rp value, 0.58; P = .003) and the hippocampus (rp value, 0.41; P = .048).

In contrast, there were no significant changes in synaptic density in either the neocortex (rp value, –0.01; P = .95) or the hippocampus (rp value, –0.06; P = .62) in the hippocampus.

“That is consistent with our clinical observation that it takes time to evolve synaptic density, along with clinical improvement. Does that mean that the increase in synaptic density is a precondition for improvement in symptoms? We don’t know,” said Dr. Knudsen.
 

Exciting but not conclusive

Session co-chair Oliver Howes, MD, PhD, professor of molecular psychiatry, King’s College London, agreed that the results do not prove the gradual increase in synaptic density the treatment response lag with SSRIs.

“We definitely don’t yet have all the data to know one way or the other,” he said in an interview.

Another potential hypothesis, he said, is that SSRIs are causing shifts in underlying brain circuits that lead to cognitive changes before there is a discernable improvement in mood.

Indeed, Dr. Howes suggested that increases in synaptic density and cognitive changes related to SSRI use are not necessarily dependent on each other and could even be unrelated.

Also commenting on the research, David Nutt, MD, PhD, Edmond J. Safra professor of neuropsychopharmacology at Imperial College London, said that the “delay in therapeutic action of antidepressants has been a puzzle to psychiatrists ever since they were first discerned over 50 years ago. So, these new data in humans, that use cutting edge brain imaging to demonstrate an increase in brain connections developing over the period that the depression lifts, are very exciting.”

A version of this article first appeared on Medscape.com.

BARCELONA – The typical lag between treatment initiation with selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors (SSRIs) for depression and enhanced mood may be because of the time it takes to increase brain synaptic density, new imaging data suggest.

In a double-blind study, more than 30 volunteers were randomly assigned to the SSRI escitalopram or placebo for 3-5 weeks. Using PET imaging, the investigators found that over time, synaptic density significantly increased significantly in the neocortex and hippocampus but only in patients taking the active drug.

The results point to two conclusions, said study investigator Gitta Moos Knudsen, MD, PhD, clinical professor and chief physician at the department of clinical medicine, neurology, psychiatry and sensory sciences at Copenhagen (Denmark) University Hospital.

First, they indicate that SSRIs increase synaptic density in brain areas critically involved in depression, a finding that would go some way to indicating that the synaptic density in the brain may be involved in how antidepressants function, “which would give us a target for developing novel drugs against depression,” said Dr. Knudsen.

“Secondly, our data suggest synapses build up over a period of weeks, which would explain why the effects of these drugs take time to kick in,” she added.

The findings were presented at the 36th European College of Neuropsychopharmacology (ECNP) Congress and simultaneously published online in Molecular Psychiatry.
 

Marked increase in synaptic density

SSRIs are widely used for depression as well as anxiety and obsessive-compulsive disorder. It is thought that they act via neuroplasticity and synaptic remodeling to improve cognition and emotion processing. However, the investigators note clinical evidence is lacking.

For the study, the researchers randomly assigned healthy individuals to either 20-mg escitalopram or placebo for 3-5 weeks.

They performed PET with the 11C-UCB-J tracer, which allows imaging of the synaptic vesicle glycoprotein 2A (SV2A) in the brain, synaptic density, as well as changes in density over time, in the hippocampus and neocortex.

Between May 2020 and October 2021, 17 individuals were assigned to escitalopram and 15 to placebo. There were no significant differences between two groups in terms of age, sex, and PET-related variables. Serum escitalopram measurements confirmed that all participants in the active drug group were compliant.

When synaptic density was assessed at a single time point, an average of 29 days after the intervention, there were no significant differences between the escitalopram and placebo groups in either the neocortex (P = .41) or in the hippocampus (P = .26).

However, when they performed a secondary analysis of the time-dependent effect on SV2A levels, they found a marked difference between the two study groups.

Compared with the placebo group, participants taking escitalopram had a marked increase in synaptic density in both the neocortex (rp value, 0.58; P = .003) and the hippocampus (rp value, 0.41; P = .048).

In contrast, there were no significant changes in synaptic density in either the neocortex (rp value, –0.01; P = .95) or the hippocampus (rp value, –0.06; P = .62) in the hippocampus.

“That is consistent with our clinical observation that it takes time to evolve synaptic density, along with clinical improvement. Does that mean that the increase in synaptic density is a precondition for improvement in symptoms? We don’t know,” said Dr. Knudsen.
 

Exciting but not conclusive

Session co-chair Oliver Howes, MD, PhD, professor of molecular psychiatry, King’s College London, agreed that the results do not prove the gradual increase in synaptic density the treatment response lag with SSRIs.

“We definitely don’t yet have all the data to know one way or the other,” he said in an interview.

Another potential hypothesis, he said, is that SSRIs are causing shifts in underlying brain circuits that lead to cognitive changes before there is a discernable improvement in mood.

Indeed, Dr. Howes suggested that increases in synaptic density and cognitive changes related to SSRI use are not necessarily dependent on each other and could even be unrelated.

Also commenting on the research, David Nutt, MD, PhD, Edmond J. Safra professor of neuropsychopharmacology at Imperial College London, said that the “delay in therapeutic action of antidepressants has been a puzzle to psychiatrists ever since they were first discerned over 50 years ago. So, these new data in humans, that use cutting edge brain imaging to demonstrate an increase in brain connections developing over the period that the depression lifts, are very exciting.”

A version of this article first appeared on Medscape.com.

BARCELONA – The typical lag between treatment initiation with selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors (SSRIs) for depression and enhanced mood may be because of the time it takes to increase brain synaptic density, new imaging data suggest.

In a double-blind study, more than 30 volunteers were randomly assigned to the SSRI escitalopram or placebo for 3-5 weeks. Using PET imaging, the investigators found that over time, synaptic density significantly increased significantly in the neocortex and hippocampus but only in patients taking the active drug.

The results point to two conclusions, said study investigator Gitta Moos Knudsen, MD, PhD, clinical professor and chief physician at the department of clinical medicine, neurology, psychiatry and sensory sciences at Copenhagen (Denmark) University Hospital.

First, they indicate that SSRIs increase synaptic density in brain areas critically involved in depression, a finding that would go some way to indicating that the synaptic density in the brain may be involved in how antidepressants function, “which would give us a target for developing novel drugs against depression,” said Dr. Knudsen.

“Secondly, our data suggest synapses build up over a period of weeks, which would explain why the effects of these drugs take time to kick in,” she added.

The findings were presented at the 36th European College of Neuropsychopharmacology (ECNP) Congress and simultaneously published online in Molecular Psychiatry.
 

Marked increase in synaptic density

SSRIs are widely used for depression as well as anxiety and obsessive-compulsive disorder. It is thought that they act via neuroplasticity and synaptic remodeling to improve cognition and emotion processing. However, the investigators note clinical evidence is lacking.

For the study, the researchers randomly assigned healthy individuals to either 20-mg escitalopram or placebo for 3-5 weeks.

They performed PET with the 11C-UCB-J tracer, which allows imaging of the synaptic vesicle glycoprotein 2A (SV2A) in the brain, synaptic density, as well as changes in density over time, in the hippocampus and neocortex.

Between May 2020 and October 2021, 17 individuals were assigned to escitalopram and 15 to placebo. There were no significant differences between two groups in terms of age, sex, and PET-related variables. Serum escitalopram measurements confirmed that all participants in the active drug group were compliant.

When synaptic density was assessed at a single time point, an average of 29 days after the intervention, there were no significant differences between the escitalopram and placebo groups in either the neocortex (P = .41) or in the hippocampus (P = .26).

However, when they performed a secondary analysis of the time-dependent effect on SV2A levels, they found a marked difference between the two study groups.

Compared with the placebo group, participants taking escitalopram had a marked increase in synaptic density in both the neocortex (rp value, 0.58; P = .003) and the hippocampus (rp value, 0.41; P = .048).

In contrast, there were no significant changes in synaptic density in either the neocortex (rp value, –0.01; P = .95) or the hippocampus (rp value, –0.06; P = .62) in the hippocampus.

“That is consistent with our clinical observation that it takes time to evolve synaptic density, along with clinical improvement. Does that mean that the increase in synaptic density is a precondition for improvement in symptoms? We don’t know,” said Dr. Knudsen.
 

Exciting but not conclusive

Session co-chair Oliver Howes, MD, PhD, professor of molecular psychiatry, King’s College London, agreed that the results do not prove the gradual increase in synaptic density the treatment response lag with SSRIs.

“We definitely don’t yet have all the data to know one way or the other,” he said in an interview.

Another potential hypothesis, he said, is that SSRIs are causing shifts in underlying brain circuits that lead to cognitive changes before there is a discernable improvement in mood.

Indeed, Dr. Howes suggested that increases in synaptic density and cognitive changes related to SSRI use are not necessarily dependent on each other and could even be unrelated.

Also commenting on the research, David Nutt, MD, PhD, Edmond J. Safra professor of neuropsychopharmacology at Imperial College London, said that the “delay in therapeutic action of antidepressants has been a puzzle to psychiatrists ever since they were first discerned over 50 years ago. So, these new data in humans, that use cutting edge brain imaging to demonstrate an increase in brain connections developing over the period that the depression lifts, are very exciting.”

A version of this article first appeared on Medscape.com.

There is steady advance in the treatment of PsA. Bimekizumab is a novel monoclonal antibody that, by binding to similar sites on interleukin (IL)-17A and IL-17F, inhibits these cytokines. Ritchlin and colleagues recently reported the 52-week results from the phase 3 BE OPTIMAL study including 852 biological disease-modifying antirheumatic drug (bDMARD)-naive patients with active PsA who were randomly assigned to receive bimekizumab, adalimumab, or placebo. At week 16, 43.9% of patients receiving bimekizumab achieved ≥ 50% improvement in the American College of Rheumatology scores (ACR50), with the response being maintained up to week 52 (54.5%). Among patients who switched from placebo to bimekizumab at week 16, a similar proportion (53.0%) achieved ACR50 at week 52. No new safety signals were observed. Thus, bimekizumab led to sustained improvements in clinical response up to week 52 and probably will soon be available to patients with PsA.

The optimal management of axial PsA continues to be investigated. One major question is whether IL-23 inhibitors, which are not efficacious in axial spondyloarthritis, have efficacy in axial PsA. A post hoc analysis of the DISCOVER-2 study included 246 biologic-naive patients with active PsA and sacroiliitis who were randomly assigned to guselkumab every 4 weeks (Q4W; n = 82), guselkumab every 8 weeks (Q8W; n = 68), or placebo with crossover to guselkumab Q4W at week 24 (n = 96), Mease and colleagues report that at week 24, guselkumab Q4W and Q8W vs placebo showed significantly greater scores in the total Bath Ankylosing Spondylitis Disease Activity Index (BASDAI) as well as Ankylosing Spondylitis Disease Activity Score (ASDAS), with further improvements noted at week 100. Thus, in patients with active PsA and imaging-confirmed sacroiliitis, 100 mg guselkumab Q4W and Q8W yielded clinically meaningful and sustained improvements in axial symptoms through 2 years.

Finally, attention is currently being paid to patients with refractory or difficult-to-treat (D2T) PsA. These patients are generally characterized as having active disease despite treatment with two or more targeted DMARD (tDMARD). Philippoteaux and colleagues have reported results from their retrospective cohort study that included 150 patients with PsA who initiated treatment with tDMARD and were followed for at least 2 years, of whom 49 patients had D2T PsA. They found that peripheral structural damage, axial involvement, and the discontinuation of bDMARD due to poor skin psoriasis control were more prevalent in patients with D2T PsA compared with in non-D2T PsA. Thus, patients with D2T PsA are more likely to have more structural damage. Early diagnosis and treatment to reduce structural damage might reduce the prevalence of D2T PsA.

There is steady advance in the treatment of PsA. Bimekizumab is a novel monoclonal antibody that, by binding to similar sites on interleukin (IL)-17A and IL-17F, inhibits these cytokines. Ritchlin and colleagues recently reported the 52-week results from the phase 3 BE OPTIMAL study including 852 biological disease-modifying antirheumatic drug (bDMARD)-naive patients with active PsA who were randomly assigned to receive bimekizumab, adalimumab, or placebo. At week 16, 43.9% of patients receiving bimekizumab achieved ≥ 50% improvement in the American College of Rheumatology scores (ACR50), with the response being maintained up to week 52 (54.5%). Among patients who switched from placebo to bimekizumab at week 16, a similar proportion (53.0%) achieved ACR50 at week 52. No new safety signals were observed. Thus, bimekizumab led to sustained improvements in clinical response up to week 52 and probably will soon be available to patients with PsA.

The optimal management of axial PsA continues to be investigated. One major question is whether IL-23 inhibitors, which are not efficacious in axial spondyloarthritis, have efficacy in axial PsA. A post hoc analysis of the DISCOVER-2 study included 246 biologic-naive patients with active PsA and sacroiliitis who were randomly assigned to guselkumab every 4 weeks (Q4W; n = 82), guselkumab every 8 weeks (Q8W; n = 68), or placebo with crossover to guselkumab Q4W at week 24 (n = 96), Mease and colleagues report that at week 24, guselkumab Q4W and Q8W vs placebo showed significantly greater scores in the total Bath Ankylosing Spondylitis Disease Activity Index (BASDAI) as well as Ankylosing Spondylitis Disease Activity Score (ASDAS), with further improvements noted at week 100. Thus, in patients with active PsA and imaging-confirmed sacroiliitis, 100 mg guselkumab Q4W and Q8W yielded clinically meaningful and sustained improvements in axial symptoms through 2 years.

Finally, attention is currently being paid to patients with refractory or difficult-to-treat (D2T) PsA. These patients are generally characterized as having active disease despite treatment with two or more targeted DMARD (tDMARD). Philippoteaux and colleagues have reported results from their retrospective cohort study that included 150 patients with PsA who initiated treatment with tDMARD and were followed for at least 2 years, of whom 49 patients had D2T PsA. They found that peripheral structural damage, axial involvement, and the discontinuation of bDMARD due to poor skin psoriasis control were more prevalent in patients with D2T PsA compared with in non-D2T PsA. Thus, patients with D2T PsA are more likely to have more structural damage. Early diagnosis and treatment to reduce structural damage might reduce the prevalence of D2T PsA.

There is steady advance in the treatment of PsA. Bimekizumab is a novel monoclonal antibody that, by binding to similar sites on interleukin (IL)-17A and IL-17F, inhibits these cytokines. Ritchlin and colleagues recently reported the 52-week results from the phase 3 BE OPTIMAL study including 852 biological disease-modifying antirheumatic drug (bDMARD)-naive patients with active PsA who were randomly assigned to receive bimekizumab, adalimumab, or placebo. At week 16, 43.9% of patients receiving bimekizumab achieved ≥ 50% improvement in the American College of Rheumatology scores (ACR50), with the response being maintained up to week 52 (54.5%). Among patients who switched from placebo to bimekizumab at week 16, a similar proportion (53.0%) achieved ACR50 at week 52. No new safety signals were observed. Thus, bimekizumab led to sustained improvements in clinical response up to week 52 and probably will soon be available to patients with PsA.

The optimal management of axial PsA continues to be investigated. One major question is whether IL-23 inhibitors, which are not efficacious in axial spondyloarthritis, have efficacy in axial PsA. A post hoc analysis of the DISCOVER-2 study included 246 biologic-naive patients with active PsA and sacroiliitis who were randomly assigned to guselkumab every 4 weeks (Q4W; n = 82), guselkumab every 8 weeks (Q8W; n = 68), or placebo with crossover to guselkumab Q4W at week 24 (n = 96), Mease and colleagues report that at week 24, guselkumab Q4W and Q8W vs placebo showed significantly greater scores in the total Bath Ankylosing Spondylitis Disease Activity Index (BASDAI) as well as Ankylosing Spondylitis Disease Activity Score (ASDAS), with further improvements noted at week 100. Thus, in patients with active PsA and imaging-confirmed sacroiliitis, 100 mg guselkumab Q4W and Q8W yielded clinically meaningful and sustained improvements in axial symptoms through 2 years.

Finally, attention is currently being paid to patients with refractory or difficult-to-treat (D2T) PsA. These patients are generally characterized as having active disease despite treatment with two or more targeted DMARD (tDMARD). Philippoteaux and colleagues have reported results from their retrospective cohort study that included 150 patients with PsA who initiated treatment with tDMARD and were followed for at least 2 years, of whom 49 patients had D2T PsA. They found that peripheral structural damage, axial involvement, and the discontinuation of bDMARD due to poor skin psoriasis control were more prevalent in patients with D2T PsA compared with in non-D2T PsA. Thus, patients with D2T PsA are more likely to have more structural damage. Early diagnosis and treatment to reduce structural damage might reduce the prevalence of D2T PsA.

A type of B-cell lymphoma called early-stage I primary ocular adnexal mucosa-associated lymphoid tissue lymphoma (POAML) has highly favorable survival rates, according to new research presented at the European Society of Medical Oncology (ESMO) Congress 2023. While relapse is common, those rates are significantly lower with radiation therapy.

“Our study represents the largest institutional cohort analysis on the course of patients with stage I POAML,” said first author Linrui Gao, MD, of the department of radiation oncology at the National Clinical Research Center for Cancer, Chinese Academy of Medical Sciences and Peking Union Medical College, in Beijing.

Dr. Gao presented these findings at ESMO 2023, held in Madrid.

“We confirm the indolent nature of this stage I disease, with mortality that is similar to the general population and a low rate of lymphoma-attributed mortality,” she said, adding that “radiation therapy was associated with the lowest relapse or disease progression, compared with [other treatments].”

POAML, which can involve lesions in areas including the eyelid, conjunctiva, orbit, and lacrimal gland, makes up about 7% of mucosa-associated lymphoid tissue (MALT) lymphomas. However, the incidence is reported to be steadily increasing. With the majority of patients, 70%-85%, diagnosed as stage I, consensus on treatment approaches is lacking.

Guidelines typically recommend radiation therapy as the standard of care, and approximately 70% of POAML patients do receive the therapy, compared with only about 36% of those with early-stage MALT lymphoma, with the indolent nature of the disease likely weighing on decisions to forgo the treatment, Dr. Gao reported.

“Adoption of initial radiotherapy in early-stage POAML is relatively low worldwide, with possible reasons being [concerns] of a low survival benefit and long-term toxicities,” she said.

To evaluate the long-term outcomes based on baseline clinical features and treatments, Dr. Gao and colleagues conducted a retrospective study of 262 patients with stage I POAML (ipsilateral or bilateral disease), enrolled between January 2000 and December 2020 at two hospitals in China.

Of the patients, who had a median age of 55 and a male-female ratio of 1:3, 82 were initially treated with radiation therapy, 81 with observation, 70 with surgery, and 29 with systemic treatment.

Those receiving radiation therapy had higher rates of an Eastern Cooperative Oncology Group performance status of 1 or higher (P = .02), higher elevations of LDH (P = .03), and higher rates of chronic disease (P < .001), while other baseline characteristics between the groups, including age, T stage, symptom duration, and other factors, were similar.

With a median follow-up of 66 months, the 5-year and 10-year overall survival rates were 96.8% and 90%, respectively, which is similar to the survival rate in the general population in China.

Likewise, the 5- and 10-year rates of lymphoma-specific mortality were both extremely low, at 0.4%, and the corresponding rates of competing nonlymphoma mortality at 5 and 10 years were 2.3% and 4.2%, also consistent with the general population.

The 5- and 10-year mortality rates remained similar to the general population in stratifying patients according to the initial treatment type (P = .767 between treatments).

In terms of recurrence, the overall failure rates were relatively high, with 19.5% of patients experiencing relapse at 5 years and 24.05% at 10 years.

“The failure rates show that the risk of relapse in POAML does not decrease over time,” Dr. Gao said.

Notably, those treated with radiation therapy had a significantly decreased 5-year cumulative risk of failure (8.5%), compared with those who only received observation (29.6%), surgery (22.9%), or systemic treatment (17.2%; overall, P = .002).

The most common failure site was the ipsilateral orbit, and again, rates of those relapses were significantly lower with radiation therapy (2.4%), compared with observation (23.5%), surgery (21.4%), and systemic treatment (17.3%).

However, rates of relapses in other sites, including the contralateral orbit, extraocular site, and multiple sites, were similar among all treatment groups. One patient receiving systemic treatment had large cell transformation, associated with poorer outcomes.

Strategies after recurrence were salvage therapy for 53 patients, including 27 receiving radiation therapy, and observation for 10 patients.

Dr. Gao noted that treatment failure was not associated with higher mortality rates. “However, given the limited number of cases, we think more cases and longer follow-up are needed,” she told MDedge.

Among the most common acute toxicities were ocular dermatitis or mucositis, described as mild, among 23 patients receiving radiation therapy. Nine patients experienced postoperative complications of mild eye irritation and periorbital edema, and five patients receiving systemic treatment experienced grade 2-3 leukopenia. There were no severe adverse events.

In terms of late ocular adverse effects, overall, 3 patients in the radiation therapy group developed cataracts and 143 patients developed dry-eye disease.

“Radiation therapy was associated with the lowest rate of relapse progression, compared with observation, surgery, and systemic treatment, with similar overall and recurrent survival,” Dr. Gao said.

“Based on our study results, radiotherapy should be considered as the optimal treatment for all patients with stage I disease because of its lowest failure risk and minor toxicity,” Dr. Gao told MDedge.

“However, the radiotherapy dose and techniques should be further optimized in good clinical trials,” she noted. “There are some clinical studies undergoing to explore the modern radiotherapy strategy, including by our group.”

Commenting on the study, discussant Olivier Casasnovas, MD, PhD, of the department of hematology, University Hospital Francois Mitterrand, in Dijon, France, noted that “interestingly, radiotherapy reduced the risk of local relapse but not systemic relapse.”


 

Benefits linked to radiation therapy dose?

Furthermore, the study adds to evidence suggesting the role of dose in radiation therapy’s benefits in POAML, Dr. Casanovas noted. He pointed to previous research showing that, with a median radiotherapy dose of 26 Gy, stage I POAML patients had a local relapse rate of 9.5%, whereas in the current study, which reported a median radiotherapy dose of 30.6 Gy, the local relapse rate was just 2%.

“Regarding the risk of local relapse, it’s important to see that, as previous published, the risk of a local relapse depends probably on the dose of radiotherapy,” he said.

The results indicate that “radiation therapy could impact patients’ outcome. In comparison to previous research, this suggests benefits from a higher dose.”

He added that “it would be interesting to test in this series if patients receiving more or less 30 Gy had different outcomes or the risks of failure at different sites.”

Overall, the study confirms that POAML “can be safely treated with radiation therapy, which allows for a better chance of local control, compared with other options, but does not preclude relapse over time,” Dr. Casasnovas concluded, adding, “I think that a standardization of radiotherapy dose is warranted to provide guidelines to clinicians treating this infrequent population of patients.”

The authors had no disclosures to report.

A type of B-cell lymphoma called early-stage I primary ocular adnexal mucosa-associated lymphoid tissue lymphoma (POAML) has highly favorable survival rates, according to new research presented at the European Society of Medical Oncology (ESMO) Congress 2023. While relapse is common, those rates are significantly lower with radiation therapy.

“Our study represents the largest institutional cohort analysis on the course of patients with stage I POAML,” said first author Linrui Gao, MD, of the department of radiation oncology at the National Clinical Research Center for Cancer, Chinese Academy of Medical Sciences and Peking Union Medical College, in Beijing.

Dr. Gao presented these findings at ESMO 2023, held in Madrid.

“We confirm the indolent nature of this stage I disease, with mortality that is similar to the general population and a low rate of lymphoma-attributed mortality,” she said, adding that “radiation therapy was associated with the lowest relapse or disease progression, compared with [other treatments].”

POAML, which can involve lesions in areas including the eyelid, conjunctiva, orbit, and lacrimal gland, makes up about 7% of mucosa-associated lymphoid tissue (MALT) lymphomas. However, the incidence is reported to be steadily increasing. With the majority of patients, 70%-85%, diagnosed as stage I, consensus on treatment approaches is lacking.

Guidelines typically recommend radiation therapy as the standard of care, and approximately 70% of POAML patients do receive the therapy, compared with only about 36% of those with early-stage MALT lymphoma, with the indolent nature of the disease likely weighing on decisions to forgo the treatment, Dr. Gao reported.

“Adoption of initial radiotherapy in early-stage POAML is relatively low worldwide, with possible reasons being [concerns] of a low survival benefit and long-term toxicities,” she said.

To evaluate the long-term outcomes based on baseline clinical features and treatments, Dr. Gao and colleagues conducted a retrospective study of 262 patients with stage I POAML (ipsilateral or bilateral disease), enrolled between January 2000 and December 2020 at two hospitals in China.

Of the patients, who had a median age of 55 and a male-female ratio of 1:3, 82 were initially treated with radiation therapy, 81 with observation, 70 with surgery, and 29 with systemic treatment.

Those receiving radiation therapy had higher rates of an Eastern Cooperative Oncology Group performance status of 1 or higher (P = .02), higher elevations of LDH (P = .03), and higher rates of chronic disease (P < .001), while other baseline characteristics between the groups, including age, T stage, symptom duration, and other factors, were similar.

With a median follow-up of 66 months, the 5-year and 10-year overall survival rates were 96.8% and 90%, respectively, which is similar to the survival rate in the general population in China.

Likewise, the 5- and 10-year rates of lymphoma-specific mortality were both extremely low, at 0.4%, and the corresponding rates of competing nonlymphoma mortality at 5 and 10 years were 2.3% and 4.2%, also consistent with the general population.

The 5- and 10-year mortality rates remained similar to the general population in stratifying patients according to the initial treatment type (P = .767 between treatments).

In terms of recurrence, the overall failure rates were relatively high, with 19.5% of patients experiencing relapse at 5 years and 24.05% at 10 years.

“The failure rates show that the risk of relapse in POAML does not decrease over time,” Dr. Gao said.

Notably, those treated with radiation therapy had a significantly decreased 5-year cumulative risk of failure (8.5%), compared with those who only received observation (29.6%), surgery (22.9%), or systemic treatment (17.2%; overall, P = .002).

The most common failure site was the ipsilateral orbit, and again, rates of those relapses were significantly lower with radiation therapy (2.4%), compared with observation (23.5%), surgery (21.4%), and systemic treatment (17.3%).

However, rates of relapses in other sites, including the contralateral orbit, extraocular site, and multiple sites, were similar among all treatment groups. One patient receiving systemic treatment had large cell transformation, associated with poorer outcomes.

Strategies after recurrence were salvage therapy for 53 patients, including 27 receiving radiation therapy, and observation for 10 patients.

Dr. Gao noted that treatment failure was not associated with higher mortality rates. “However, given the limited number of cases, we think more cases and longer follow-up are needed,” she told MDedge.

Among the most common acute toxicities were ocular dermatitis or mucositis, described as mild, among 23 patients receiving radiation therapy. Nine patients experienced postoperative complications of mild eye irritation and periorbital edema, and five patients receiving systemic treatment experienced grade 2-3 leukopenia. There were no severe adverse events.

In terms of late ocular adverse effects, overall, 3 patients in the radiation therapy group developed cataracts and 143 patients developed dry-eye disease.

“Radiation therapy was associated with the lowest rate of relapse progression, compared with observation, surgery, and systemic treatment, with similar overall and recurrent survival,” Dr. Gao said.

“Based on our study results, radiotherapy should be considered as the optimal treatment for all patients with stage I disease because of its lowest failure risk and minor toxicity,” Dr. Gao told MDedge.

“However, the radiotherapy dose and techniques should be further optimized in good clinical trials,” she noted. “There are some clinical studies undergoing to explore the modern radiotherapy strategy, including by our group.”

Commenting on the study, discussant Olivier Casasnovas, MD, PhD, of the department of hematology, University Hospital Francois Mitterrand, in Dijon, France, noted that “interestingly, radiotherapy reduced the risk of local relapse but not systemic relapse.”


 

Benefits linked to radiation therapy dose?

Furthermore, the study adds to evidence suggesting the role of dose in radiation therapy’s benefits in POAML, Dr. Casanovas noted. He pointed to previous research showing that, with a median radiotherapy dose of 26 Gy, stage I POAML patients had a local relapse rate of 9.5%, whereas in the current study, which reported a median radiotherapy dose of 30.6 Gy, the local relapse rate was just 2%.

“Regarding the risk of local relapse, it’s important to see that, as previous published, the risk of a local relapse depends probably on the dose of radiotherapy,” he said.

The results indicate that “radiation therapy could impact patients’ outcome. In comparison to previous research, this suggests benefits from a higher dose.”

He added that “it would be interesting to test in this series if patients receiving more or less 30 Gy had different outcomes or the risks of failure at different sites.”

Overall, the study confirms that POAML “can be safely treated with radiation therapy, which allows for a better chance of local control, compared with other options, but does not preclude relapse over time,” Dr. Casasnovas concluded, adding, “I think that a standardization of radiotherapy dose is warranted to provide guidelines to clinicians treating this infrequent population of patients.”

The authors had no disclosures to report.

A type of B-cell lymphoma called early-stage I primary ocular adnexal mucosa-associated lymphoid tissue lymphoma (POAML) has highly favorable survival rates, according to new research presented at the European Society of Medical Oncology (ESMO) Congress 2023. While relapse is common, those rates are significantly lower with radiation therapy.

“Our study represents the largest institutional cohort analysis on the course of patients with stage I POAML,” said first author Linrui Gao, MD, of the department of radiation oncology at the National Clinical Research Center for Cancer, Chinese Academy of Medical Sciences and Peking Union Medical College, in Beijing.

Dr. Gao presented these findings at ESMO 2023, held in Madrid.

“We confirm the indolent nature of this stage I disease, with mortality that is similar to the general population and a low rate of lymphoma-attributed mortality,” she said, adding that “radiation therapy was associated with the lowest relapse or disease progression, compared with [other treatments].”

POAML, which can involve lesions in areas including the eyelid, conjunctiva, orbit, and lacrimal gland, makes up about 7% of mucosa-associated lymphoid tissue (MALT) lymphomas. However, the incidence is reported to be steadily increasing. With the majority of patients, 70%-85%, diagnosed as stage I, consensus on treatment approaches is lacking.

Guidelines typically recommend radiation therapy as the standard of care, and approximately 70% of POAML patients do receive the therapy, compared with only about 36% of those with early-stage MALT lymphoma, with the indolent nature of the disease likely weighing on decisions to forgo the treatment, Dr. Gao reported.

“Adoption of initial radiotherapy in early-stage POAML is relatively low worldwide, with possible reasons being [concerns] of a low survival benefit and long-term toxicities,” she said.

To evaluate the long-term outcomes based on baseline clinical features and treatments, Dr. Gao and colleagues conducted a retrospective study of 262 patients with stage I POAML (ipsilateral or bilateral disease), enrolled between January 2000 and December 2020 at two hospitals in China.

Of the patients, who had a median age of 55 and a male-female ratio of 1:3, 82 were initially treated with radiation therapy, 81 with observation, 70 with surgery, and 29 with systemic treatment.

Those receiving radiation therapy had higher rates of an Eastern Cooperative Oncology Group performance status of 1 or higher (P = .02), higher elevations of LDH (P = .03), and higher rates of chronic disease (P < .001), while other baseline characteristics between the groups, including age, T stage, symptom duration, and other factors, were similar.

With a median follow-up of 66 months, the 5-year and 10-year overall survival rates were 96.8% and 90%, respectively, which is similar to the survival rate in the general population in China.

Likewise, the 5- and 10-year rates of lymphoma-specific mortality were both extremely low, at 0.4%, and the corresponding rates of competing nonlymphoma mortality at 5 and 10 years were 2.3% and 4.2%, also consistent with the general population.

The 5- and 10-year mortality rates remained similar to the general population in stratifying patients according to the initial treatment type (P = .767 between treatments).

In terms of recurrence, the overall failure rates were relatively high, with 19.5% of patients experiencing relapse at 5 years and 24.05% at 10 years.

“The failure rates show that the risk of relapse in POAML does not decrease over time,” Dr. Gao said.

Notably, those treated with radiation therapy had a significantly decreased 5-year cumulative risk of failure (8.5%), compared with those who only received observation (29.6%), surgery (22.9%), or systemic treatment (17.2%; overall, P = .002).

The most common failure site was the ipsilateral orbit, and again, rates of those relapses were significantly lower with radiation therapy (2.4%), compared with observation (23.5%), surgery (21.4%), and systemic treatment (17.3%).

However, rates of relapses in other sites, including the contralateral orbit, extraocular site, and multiple sites, were similar among all treatment groups. One patient receiving systemic treatment had large cell transformation, associated with poorer outcomes.

Strategies after recurrence were salvage therapy for 53 patients, including 27 receiving radiation therapy, and observation for 10 patients.

Dr. Gao noted that treatment failure was not associated with higher mortality rates. “However, given the limited number of cases, we think more cases and longer follow-up are needed,” she told MDedge.

Among the most common acute toxicities were ocular dermatitis or mucositis, described as mild, among 23 patients receiving radiation therapy. Nine patients experienced postoperative complications of mild eye irritation and periorbital edema, and five patients receiving systemic treatment experienced grade 2-3 leukopenia. There were no severe adverse events.

In terms of late ocular adverse effects, overall, 3 patients in the radiation therapy group developed cataracts and 143 patients developed dry-eye disease.

“Radiation therapy was associated with the lowest rate of relapse progression, compared with observation, surgery, and systemic treatment, with similar overall and recurrent survival,” Dr. Gao said.

“Based on our study results, radiotherapy should be considered as the optimal treatment for all patients with stage I disease because of its lowest failure risk and minor toxicity,” Dr. Gao told MDedge.

“However, the radiotherapy dose and techniques should be further optimized in good clinical trials,” she noted. “There are some clinical studies undergoing to explore the modern radiotherapy strategy, including by our group.”

Commenting on the study, discussant Olivier Casasnovas, MD, PhD, of the department of hematology, University Hospital Francois Mitterrand, in Dijon, France, noted that “interestingly, radiotherapy reduced the risk of local relapse but not systemic relapse.”


 

Benefits linked to radiation therapy dose?

Furthermore, the study adds to evidence suggesting the role of dose in radiation therapy’s benefits in POAML, Dr. Casanovas noted. He pointed to previous research showing that, with a median radiotherapy dose of 26 Gy, stage I POAML patients had a local relapse rate of 9.5%, whereas in the current study, which reported a median radiotherapy dose of 30.6 Gy, the local relapse rate was just 2%.

“Regarding the risk of local relapse, it’s important to see that, as previous published, the risk of a local relapse depends probably on the dose of radiotherapy,” he said.

The results indicate that “radiation therapy could impact patients’ outcome. In comparison to previous research, this suggests benefits from a higher dose.”

He added that “it would be interesting to test in this series if patients receiving more or less 30 Gy had different outcomes or the risks of failure at different sites.”

Overall, the study confirms that POAML “can be safely treated with radiation therapy, which allows for a better chance of local control, compared with other options, but does not preclude relapse over time,” Dr. Casasnovas concluded, adding, “I think that a standardization of radiotherapy dose is warranted to provide guidelines to clinicians treating this infrequent population of patients.”

The authors had no disclosures to report.

It’s upper respiratory infection (URI) season. The following is a clinical scenario drawn from my own practice. I’ll tell you what I plan to do, but I’m most interested in crowdsourcing a response from all of you to collectively determine best practice. So please answer the polling questions and contribute your thoughts in the comments, whether you agree or disagree with me.

The patient

The patient is a 69-year-old woman with a 3-day history of cough, nasal congestion, malaise, tactile fever, and poor appetite. She has no sick contacts. She denies dyspnea, presyncope, and chest pain. She has tried guaifenesin and ibuprofen for her symptoms, which helped a little.

She is up to date on immunizations, including four doses of COVID-19 vaccine and the influenza vaccine, which she received 2 months ago.

The patient has a history of heart failure with reduced ejection fraction, coronary artery disease, hypertension, chronic kidney disease stage 3aA2, obesity, and osteoarthritis. Current medications include atorvastatin, losartan, metoprolol, and aspirin.

Her weight is stable at 212 lb, and her vital signs today are:

• Temperature: 37.5° C
• Pulse: 60 beats/min
• Blood pressure: 150/88 mm Hg
• Respiration rate: 14 breaths/min
• SpO₂: 93% on room air

What information is most critical before deciding on management?

Your peers chose: 

• The patient’s history of viral URIs

 14%

 

• Whether her cough is productive and the color of the sputum

 38%

 

• How well this season’s flu vaccine matches circulating influenza viruses

 8%

 

• Local epidemiology of major viral pathogens (e.g., SARS-CoV-2, influenza, RSV)

 40%
 

Dr. Vega’s take

To provide the best care for our patients when they are threatened with multiple viral upper respiratory pathogens, it is imperative that clinicians have some idea regarding the epidemiology of viral infections, with as much local data as possible. This knowledge will help direct appropriate testing and treatment.

Modern viral molecular testing platforms are highly accurate, but they are not infallible. Small flaws in specificity and sensitivity of testing are magnified when community viral circulation is low. In a U.K. study conducted during a period of low COVID-19 prevalence, the positive predictive value of reverse-transcriptase polymerase chain reaction (RT-PCR) testing was just 16%. Although the negative predictive value was much higher, the false-positive rate of testing was still 0.5%. The authors of the study describe important potential consequences of false-positive results, such as being temporarily removed from an organ transplant list and unnecessary contact tracing.
 

Testing and treatment

Your county public health department maintains a website describing local activity of SARS-CoV-2 and influenza. Both viruses are in heavy circulation now.

What is the next best step in this patient’s management?

Your peers chose: 

• Treat empirically with ritonavir-boosted nirmatrelvir

 7%

 

• Treat empirically with oseltamivir or baloxavir

 14%

 

• Perform lab-based multiplex RT-PCR testing and wait to treat on the basis of results

 34%

 

• Perform rapid nucleic acid amplification testing (NAAT) and treat on the basis of results

 45%

Every practice has different resources and should use the best means available to treat patients. Ideally, this patient would undergo rapid NAAT with results available within 30 minutes. Test results will help guide not only treatment decisions but also infection-control measures.

The Infectious Diseases Society of America has provided updates for testing for URIs since the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic. Both laboratory-based and point-of-care rapid NAATs are recommended for testing. Rapid NAATs have been demonstrated to have a sensitivity of 96% and specificity of 100% in the detection of SARS-CoV-2. Obviously, they also offer a highly efficient means to make treatment and isolation decisions.

There are multiple platforms for molecular testing available. Laboratory-based platforms can test for dozens of potential pathogens, including bacteria. Rapid NAATs often have the ability to test for SARS-CoV-2, influenza, and respiratory syncytial virus (RSV). This functionality is important, because these infections generally are difficult to discriminate on the basis of clinical information alone.

The IDSA clearly recognizes the challenges of trying to manage cases of URI. For example, they state that testing of the anterior nares (AN) or oropharynx (OP) is acceptable, even though testing from the nasopharynx offers increased sensitivity. However, testing at the AN/OP allows for patient self-collection of samples, which is also recommended as an option by the IDSA. In an analysis of six cohort studies, the pooled sensitivity of patient-collected nasopharyngeal samples from the AN/OP was 88%, whereas the respective value for samples taken by health care providers was 95%.

The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention also provides recommendations for the management of patients with acute upper respiratory illness. Patients who are sick enough to be hospitalized should be tested at least for SARS-CoV-2 and influenza using molecular assays. Outpatients should be tested for SARS-CoV-2 with either molecular or antigen testing, and influenza testing should be offered if the findings will change decisions regarding treatment or isolation. Practically speaking, the recommendations for influenza testing mean that most individuals should be tested, including patients at high risk for complications of influenza and those who might have exposure to individuals at high risk.

Treatment of COVID-19 should only be provided in cases of a positive test within 5 days of symptom onset. However, clinicians may treat patients with anti-influenza medications presumptively if test results are not immediately available and the patient has worsening symptoms or is in a group at high risk for complications.

What are some of the challenges that you have faced during the COVID-19 pandemic regarding the management of patients with acute URIs? What have you found in terms of solutions, and where do gaps in quality of care persist? Please add your comments. I will review and circle back with a response. Thank you!

A version of this article first appeared on Medscape.com.

It’s upper respiratory infection (URI) season. The following is a clinical scenario drawn from my own practice. I’ll tell you what I plan to do, but I’m most interested in crowdsourcing a response from all of you to collectively determine best practice. So please answer the polling questions and contribute your thoughts in the comments, whether you agree or disagree with me.

The patient

The patient is a 69-year-old woman with a 3-day history of cough, nasal congestion, malaise, tactile fever, and poor appetite. She has no sick contacts. She denies dyspnea, presyncope, and chest pain. She has tried guaifenesin and ibuprofen for her symptoms, which helped a little.

She is up to date on immunizations, including four doses of COVID-19 vaccine and the influenza vaccine, which she received 2 months ago.

The patient has a history of heart failure with reduced ejection fraction, coronary artery disease, hypertension, chronic kidney disease stage 3aA2, obesity, and osteoarthritis. Current medications include atorvastatin, losartan, metoprolol, and aspirin.

Her weight is stable at 212 lb, and her vital signs today are:

• Temperature: 37.5° C
• Pulse: 60 beats/min
• Blood pressure: 150/88 mm Hg
• Respiration rate: 14 breaths/min
• SpO₂: 93% on room air

What information is most critical before deciding on management?

Your peers chose: 

• The patient’s history of viral URIs

 14%

 

• Whether her cough is productive and the color of the sputum

 38%

 

• How well this season’s flu vaccine matches circulating influenza viruses

 8%

 

• Local epidemiology of major viral pathogens (e.g., SARS-CoV-2, influenza, RSV)

 40%
 

Dr. Vega’s take

To provide the best care for our patients when they are threatened with multiple viral upper respiratory pathogens, it is imperative that clinicians have some idea regarding the epidemiology of viral infections, with as much local data as possible. This knowledge will help direct appropriate testing and treatment.

Modern viral molecular testing platforms are highly accurate, but they are not infallible. Small flaws in specificity and sensitivity of testing are magnified when community viral circulation is low. In a U.K. study conducted during a period of low COVID-19 prevalence, the positive predictive value of reverse-transcriptase polymerase chain reaction (RT-PCR) testing was just 16%. Although the negative predictive value was much higher, the false-positive rate of testing was still 0.5%. The authors of the study describe important potential consequences of false-positive results, such as being temporarily removed from an organ transplant list and unnecessary contact tracing.
 

Testing and treatment

Your county public health department maintains a website describing local activity of SARS-CoV-2 and influenza. Both viruses are in heavy circulation now.

What is the next best step in this patient’s management?

Your peers chose: 

• Treat empirically with ritonavir-boosted nirmatrelvir

 7%

 

• Treat empirically with oseltamivir or baloxavir

 14%

 

• Perform lab-based multiplex RT-PCR testing and wait to treat on the basis of results

 34%

 

• Perform rapid nucleic acid amplification testing (NAAT) and treat on the basis of results

 45%

Every practice has different resources and should use the best means available to treat patients. Ideally, this patient would undergo rapid NAAT with results available within 30 minutes. Test results will help guide not only treatment decisions but also infection-control measures.

The Infectious Diseases Society of America has provided updates for testing for URIs since the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic. Both laboratory-based and point-of-care rapid NAATs are recommended for testing. Rapid NAATs have been demonstrated to have a sensitivity of 96% and specificity of 100% in the detection of SARS-CoV-2. Obviously, they also offer a highly efficient means to make treatment and isolation decisions.

There are multiple platforms for molecular testing available. Laboratory-based platforms can test for dozens of potential pathogens, including bacteria. Rapid NAATs often have the ability to test for SARS-CoV-2, influenza, and respiratory syncytial virus (RSV). This functionality is important, because these infections generally are difficult to discriminate on the basis of clinical information alone.

The IDSA clearly recognizes the challenges of trying to manage cases of URI. For example, they state that testing of the anterior nares (AN) or oropharynx (OP) is acceptable, even though testing from the nasopharynx offers increased sensitivity. However, testing at the AN/OP allows for patient self-collection of samples, which is also recommended as an option by the IDSA. In an analysis of six cohort studies, the pooled sensitivity of patient-collected nasopharyngeal samples from the AN/OP was 88%, whereas the respective value for samples taken by health care providers was 95%.

The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention also provides recommendations for the management of patients with acute upper respiratory illness. Patients who are sick enough to be hospitalized should be tested at least for SARS-CoV-2 and influenza using molecular assays. Outpatients should be tested for SARS-CoV-2 with either molecular or antigen testing, and influenza testing should be offered if the findings will change decisions regarding treatment or isolation. Practically speaking, the recommendations for influenza testing mean that most individuals should be tested, including patients at high risk for complications of influenza and those who might have exposure to individuals at high risk.

Treatment of COVID-19 should only be provided in cases of a positive test within 5 days of symptom onset. However, clinicians may treat patients with anti-influenza medications presumptively if test results are not immediately available and the patient has worsening symptoms or is in a group at high risk for complications.

What are some of the challenges that you have faced during the COVID-19 pandemic regarding the management of patients with acute URIs? What have you found in terms of solutions, and where do gaps in quality of care persist? Please add your comments. I will review and circle back with a response. Thank you!

A version of this article first appeared on Medscape.com.

It’s upper respiratory infection (URI) season. The following is a clinical scenario drawn from my own practice. I’ll tell you what I plan to do, but I’m most interested in crowdsourcing a response from all of you to collectively determine best practice. So please answer the polling questions and contribute your thoughts in the comments, whether you agree or disagree with me.

The patient

The patient is a 69-year-old woman with a 3-day history of cough, nasal congestion, malaise, tactile fever, and poor appetite. She has no sick contacts. She denies dyspnea, presyncope, and chest pain. She has tried guaifenesin and ibuprofen for her symptoms, which helped a little.

She is up to date on immunizations, including four doses of COVID-19 vaccine and the influenza vaccine, which she received 2 months ago.

The patient has a history of heart failure with reduced ejection fraction, coronary artery disease, hypertension, chronic kidney disease stage 3aA2, obesity, and osteoarthritis. Current medications include atorvastatin, losartan, metoprolol, and aspirin.

Her weight is stable at 212 lb, and her vital signs today are:

• Temperature: 37.5° C
• Pulse: 60 beats/min
• Blood pressure: 150/88 mm Hg
• Respiration rate: 14 breaths/min
• SpO₂: 93% on room air

What information is most critical before deciding on management?

Your peers chose: 

• The patient’s history of viral URIs

 14%

 

• Whether her cough is productive and the color of the sputum

 38%

 

• How well this season’s flu vaccine matches circulating influenza viruses

 8%

 

• Local epidemiology of major viral pathogens (e.g., SARS-CoV-2, influenza, RSV)

 40%
 

Dr. Vega’s take

To provide the best care for our patients when they are threatened with multiple viral upper respiratory pathogens, it is imperative that clinicians have some idea regarding the epidemiology of viral infections, with as much local data as possible. This knowledge will help direct appropriate testing and treatment.

Modern viral molecular testing platforms are highly accurate, but they are not infallible. Small flaws in specificity and sensitivity of testing are magnified when community viral circulation is low. In a U.K. study conducted during a period of low COVID-19 prevalence, the positive predictive value of reverse-transcriptase polymerase chain reaction (RT-PCR) testing was just 16%. Although the negative predictive value was much higher, the false-positive rate of testing was still 0.5%. The authors of the study describe important potential consequences of false-positive results, such as being temporarily removed from an organ transplant list and unnecessary contact tracing.
 

Testing and treatment

Your county public health department maintains a website describing local activity of SARS-CoV-2 and influenza. Both viruses are in heavy circulation now.

What is the next best step in this patient’s management?

Your peers chose: 

• Treat empirically with ritonavir-boosted nirmatrelvir

 7%

 

• Treat empirically with oseltamivir or baloxavir

 14%

 

• Perform lab-based multiplex RT-PCR testing and wait to treat on the basis of results

 34%

 

• Perform rapid nucleic acid amplification testing (NAAT) and treat on the basis of results

 45%

Every practice has different resources and should use the best means available to treat patients. Ideally, this patient would undergo rapid NAAT with results available within 30 minutes. Test results will help guide not only treatment decisions but also infection-control measures.

The Infectious Diseases Society of America has provided updates for testing for URIs since the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic. Both laboratory-based and point-of-care rapid NAATs are recommended for testing. Rapid NAATs have been demonstrated to have a sensitivity of 96% and specificity of 100% in the detection of SARS-CoV-2. Obviously, they also offer a highly efficient means to make treatment and isolation decisions.

There are multiple platforms for molecular testing available. Laboratory-based platforms can test for dozens of potential pathogens, including bacteria. Rapid NAATs often have the ability to test for SARS-CoV-2, influenza, and respiratory syncytial virus (RSV). This functionality is important, because these infections generally are difficult to discriminate on the basis of clinical information alone.

The IDSA clearly recognizes the challenges of trying to manage cases of URI. For example, they state that testing of the anterior nares (AN) or oropharynx (OP) is acceptable, even though testing from the nasopharynx offers increased sensitivity. However, testing at the AN/OP allows for patient self-collection of samples, which is also recommended as an option by the IDSA. In an analysis of six cohort studies, the pooled sensitivity of patient-collected nasopharyngeal samples from the AN/OP was 88%, whereas the respective value for samples taken by health care providers was 95%.

The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention also provides recommendations for the management of patients with acute upper respiratory illness. Patients who are sick enough to be hospitalized should be tested at least for SARS-CoV-2 and influenza using molecular assays. Outpatients should be tested for SARS-CoV-2 with either molecular or antigen testing, and influenza testing should be offered if the findings will change decisions regarding treatment or isolation. Practically speaking, the recommendations for influenza testing mean that most individuals should be tested, including patients at high risk for complications of influenza and those who might have exposure to individuals at high risk.

Treatment of COVID-19 should only be provided in cases of a positive test within 5 days of symptom onset. However, clinicians may treat patients with anti-influenza medications presumptively if test results are not immediately available and the patient has worsening symptoms or is in a group at high risk for complications.

What are some of the challenges that you have faced during the COVID-19 pandemic regarding the management of patients with acute URIs? What have you found in terms of solutions, and where do gaps in quality of care persist? Please add your comments. I will review and circle back with a response. Thank you!

A version of this article first appeared on Medscape.com.

TOPLINE:

Starting treatment with buprenorphine for opioid use disorder (OUD) via telehealth is associated with longer retention in treatment, compared with starting treatment in-person, new research suggests.

METHODOLOGY:

• Researchers analyzed Medicaid claims data from November 2019 through the end of 2020 in Kentucky and Ohio to investigate the impact of a policy change implemented during the COVID-19 pandemic that allowed the use of telehealth to prescribe buprenorphine for OUD.
• The two main outcomes of interest were retention in treatment after initiation (telehealth vs. traditional) and opioid-related nonfatal overdose after initiation.

TAKEAWAY:

• For both states combined, nearly 92,000 adults had a buprenorphine prescription in at least one quarter in 2020, with nearly 43,000 of those individuals starting treatment in 2020. 
• Sharp increases in telehealth delivery of buprenorphine were noted at the beginning of 2020 at the pandemic outset, and this was associated with greater retention in treatment (Kentucky adjusted odds ratio, 1.13; 95% confidence interval, 1.01-1.27 and Ohio aOR, 1.19; 95% CI, 1.06-1.32).
• Furthermore, 90-day retention rates were higher among those who started treatment via telehealth versus those who started treatment in nontelehealth settings in Kentucky (48% vs. 44%, respectively) and in Ohio (32% vs. 28%, respectively).
• There was no increased risk of nonfatal overdose with telehealth treatment, providing added evidence to suggest that patients were not harmed by having increased access to buprenorphine treatment via telehealth.

IN PRACTICE:

“These results offer important insights for states with a high burden of OUD looking to policies and methods to reduce barriers to treatment,” the authors write.

SOURCE:

The study, with first author Lindsey Hammerslag, PhD, with University of Kentucky College of Medicine, Lexington, was published online  in JAMA Network Open, with an invited commentary by Lindsey Allen, PhD, Northwestern University, Chicago, on navigating the path to effective, equitable, and evidence-based telehealth for OUD treatment.

LIMITATIONS:

The analysis was limited to Medicaid patients in two states over 1 year and there may have been unmeasured confounders, such as perceived patient stability, that influenced the findings. Because Medicaid data were not linked to emergency services or death records, this study considered only medically treated overdose.

DISCLOSURES:

The study was supported by the National Institute on Drug Abuse and carried out in partnership with the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration. The authors report no relevant financial relationships.

A version of this article first appeared on Medscape.com.

TOPLINE:

Starting treatment with buprenorphine for opioid use disorder (OUD) via telehealth is associated with longer retention in treatment, compared with starting treatment in-person, new research suggests.

METHODOLOGY:

• Researchers analyzed Medicaid claims data from November 2019 through the end of 2020 in Kentucky and Ohio to investigate the impact of a policy change implemented during the COVID-19 pandemic that allowed the use of telehealth to prescribe buprenorphine for OUD.
• The two main outcomes of interest were retention in treatment after initiation (telehealth vs. traditional) and opioid-related nonfatal overdose after initiation.

TAKEAWAY:

• For both states combined, nearly 92,000 adults had a buprenorphine prescription in at least one quarter in 2020, with nearly 43,000 of those individuals starting treatment in 2020. 
• Sharp increases in telehealth delivery of buprenorphine were noted at the beginning of 2020 at the pandemic outset, and this was associated with greater retention in treatment (Kentucky adjusted odds ratio, 1.13; 95% confidence interval, 1.01-1.27 and Ohio aOR, 1.19; 95% CI, 1.06-1.32).
• Furthermore, 90-day retention rates were higher among those who started treatment via telehealth versus those who started treatment in nontelehealth settings in Kentucky (48% vs. 44%, respectively) and in Ohio (32% vs. 28%, respectively).
• There was no increased risk of nonfatal overdose with telehealth treatment, providing added evidence to suggest that patients were not harmed by having increased access to buprenorphine treatment via telehealth.

IN PRACTICE:

“These results offer important insights for states with a high burden of OUD looking to policies and methods to reduce barriers to treatment,” the authors write.

SOURCE:

The study, with first author Lindsey Hammerslag, PhD, with University of Kentucky College of Medicine, Lexington, was published online  in JAMA Network Open, with an invited commentary by Lindsey Allen, PhD, Northwestern University, Chicago, on navigating the path to effective, equitable, and evidence-based telehealth for OUD treatment.

LIMITATIONS:

The analysis was limited to Medicaid patients in two states over 1 year and there may have been unmeasured confounders, such as perceived patient stability, that influenced the findings. Because Medicaid data were not linked to emergency services or death records, this study considered only medically treated overdose.

DISCLOSURES:

The study was supported by the National Institute on Drug Abuse and carried out in partnership with the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration. The authors report no relevant financial relationships.

A version of this article first appeared on Medscape.com.

TOPLINE:

Starting treatment with buprenorphine for opioid use disorder (OUD) via telehealth is associated with longer retention in treatment, compared with starting treatment in-person, new research suggests.

METHODOLOGY:

• Researchers analyzed Medicaid claims data from November 2019 through the end of 2020 in Kentucky and Ohio to investigate the impact of a policy change implemented during the COVID-19 pandemic that allowed the use of telehealth to prescribe buprenorphine for OUD.
• The two main outcomes of interest were retention in treatment after initiation (telehealth vs. traditional) and opioid-related nonfatal overdose after initiation.

TAKEAWAY:

• For both states combined, nearly 92,000 adults had a buprenorphine prescription in at least one quarter in 2020, with nearly 43,000 of those individuals starting treatment in 2020. 
• Sharp increases in telehealth delivery of buprenorphine were noted at the beginning of 2020 at the pandemic outset, and this was associated with greater retention in treatment (Kentucky adjusted odds ratio, 1.13; 95% confidence interval, 1.01-1.27 and Ohio aOR, 1.19; 95% CI, 1.06-1.32).
• Furthermore, 90-day retention rates were higher among those who started treatment via telehealth versus those who started treatment in nontelehealth settings in Kentucky (48% vs. 44%, respectively) and in Ohio (32% vs. 28%, respectively).
• There was no increased risk of nonfatal overdose with telehealth treatment, providing added evidence to suggest that patients were not harmed by having increased access to buprenorphine treatment via telehealth.

IN PRACTICE:

“These results offer important insights for states with a high burden of OUD looking to policies and methods to reduce barriers to treatment,” the authors write.

SOURCE:

The study, with first author Lindsey Hammerslag, PhD, with University of Kentucky College of Medicine, Lexington, was published online  in JAMA Network Open, with an invited commentary by Lindsey Allen, PhD, Northwestern University, Chicago, on navigating the path to effective, equitable, and evidence-based telehealth for OUD treatment.

LIMITATIONS:

The analysis was limited to Medicaid patients in two states over 1 year and there may have been unmeasured confounders, such as perceived patient stability, that influenced the findings. Because Medicaid data were not linked to emergency services or death records, this study considered only medically treated overdose.

DISCLOSURES:

The study was supported by the National Institute on Drug Abuse and carried out in partnership with the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration. The authors report no relevant financial relationships.

A version of this article first appeared on Medscape.com.

TOPLINE:

Intensive antihypertensive treatment provides the same benefit with regard to cardiovascular disease (CVD) and all-cause mortality regardless of the presence or absence of orthostatic or standing hypotension, new research shows.

METHODOLOGY:

• In response to ongoing concern about the benefits of intensive versus standard blood pressure treatment for adults with orthostatic hypotension (OH), researchers conducted a meta-analysis of individual patient data from nine randomized clinical trials to see whether the benefit of antihypertensive treatment was diminished for patients who had OH at baseline. Benefit was defined as a reduction in nonfatal CVD events and all-cause mortality.
• The included trials assessed BP pharmacologic treatment (more intensive BP goal or active agent) and had data on OH.

TAKEAWAY:

• The nine trials included 29,235 participants (mean age, 69 years; 48% women) who were followed for a median of 4 years; 9% had OH and 5% had standing hypotension at baseline.
• Having OH at baseline was significantly associated with the composite of CVD or all-cause mortality (hazard ratio, 1.14; 95% confidence interval, 1.04-1.26) and with all-cause mortality (HR, 1.24; 95% CI, 1.09-1.41). The same was true for baseline standing hypotension (composite outcome: HR, 1.39; 95% CI, 1.24-1.57; all-cause mortality: HR, 1.38; 95% CI, 1.14-1.66).
• More intensive BP treatment or active therapy significantly and similarly lowered risk of CVD or all-cause mortality among adults who did not have OH at baseline (HR, 0.81; 95% CI, 0.76-0.86) as well as those with OH at baseline (HR, 0.83; 95% CI, 0.70-1.00).
• More intensive BP treatment or active therapy also significantly lowered risk of CVD or all-cause mortality among those without baseline standing hypotension (HR, 0.80; 95% CI, 0.75-0.85) and nonsignificantly lowered the risk among those with baseline standing hypotension (HR, 0.94; 95% CI, 0.75-1.18).

IN PRACTICE:

“These findings suggest that orthostatic hypotension alone (that is, without symptoms) and standing hypotension measured prior to intensification of BP treatment should not deter adoption of more intensive BP treatment in adults with hypertension,” the authors conclude.

The findings should “reassure clinicians that patients with OH (and perhaps standing hypotension) will derive the full expected benefits from antihypertensive therapy,” add the authors of an accompanying editorial. “This also applies to patients treated to lower BP goals, albeit with less certainty.”

SOURCE:

The study, with first author Stephen Juraschek, MD, PhD, Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center/Harvard Medical School, Boston, and the accompanying editorial were published online in JAMA.

LIMITATIONS:

In the hypertension trials that were included in the analysis, the study populations differed, as did BP measurement procedures, interventions, duration, and CVD outcome ascertainment processes and definitions. Some trials excluded adults with low standing systolic BP, limiting the number of participants with standing hypotension. OH was determined on the basis of a seated-to-standing protocol; supine-to-standing protocols are more sensitive and may not be interchangeable. Medications used in the trials may not reflect current medicine practice, or the trials may not have included agents thought to be more likely to affect OH and falls.

DISCLOSURES:

The study had no specific funding. Dr. Juraschek has disclosed no relevant financial relationships.

A version of this article first appeared on Medscape.com.

TOPLINE:

Intensive antihypertensive treatment provides the same benefit with regard to cardiovascular disease (CVD) and all-cause mortality regardless of the presence or absence of orthostatic or standing hypotension, new research shows.

METHODOLOGY:

• In response to ongoing concern about the benefits of intensive versus standard blood pressure treatment for adults with orthostatic hypotension (OH), researchers conducted a meta-analysis of individual patient data from nine randomized clinical trials to see whether the benefit of antihypertensive treatment was diminished for patients who had OH at baseline. Benefit was defined as a reduction in nonfatal CVD events and all-cause mortality.
• The included trials assessed BP pharmacologic treatment (more intensive BP goal or active agent) and had data on OH.

TAKEAWAY:

• The nine trials included 29,235 participants (mean age, 69 years; 48% women) who were followed for a median of 4 years; 9% had OH and 5% had standing hypotension at baseline.
• Having OH at baseline was significantly associated with the composite of CVD or all-cause mortality (hazard ratio, 1.14; 95% confidence interval, 1.04-1.26) and with all-cause mortality (HR, 1.24; 95% CI, 1.09-1.41). The same was true for baseline standing hypotension (composite outcome: HR, 1.39; 95% CI, 1.24-1.57; all-cause mortality: HR, 1.38; 95% CI, 1.14-1.66).
• More intensive BP treatment or active therapy significantly and similarly lowered risk of CVD or all-cause mortality among adults who did not have OH at baseline (HR, 0.81; 95% CI, 0.76-0.86) as well as those with OH at baseline (HR, 0.83; 95% CI, 0.70-1.00).
• More intensive BP treatment or active therapy also significantly lowered risk of CVD or all-cause mortality among those without baseline standing hypotension (HR, 0.80; 95% CI, 0.75-0.85) and nonsignificantly lowered the risk among those with baseline standing hypotension (HR, 0.94; 95% CI, 0.75-1.18).

IN PRACTICE:

“These findings suggest that orthostatic hypotension alone (that is, without symptoms) and standing hypotension measured prior to intensification of BP treatment should not deter adoption of more intensive BP treatment in adults with hypertension,” the authors conclude.

The findings should “reassure clinicians that patients with OH (and perhaps standing hypotension) will derive the full expected benefits from antihypertensive therapy,” add the authors of an accompanying editorial. “This also applies to patients treated to lower BP goals, albeit with less certainty.”

SOURCE:

The study, with first author Stephen Juraschek, MD, PhD, Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center/Harvard Medical School, Boston, and the accompanying editorial were published online in JAMA.

LIMITATIONS:

In the hypertension trials that were included in the analysis, the study populations differed, as did BP measurement procedures, interventions, duration, and CVD outcome ascertainment processes and definitions. Some trials excluded adults with low standing systolic BP, limiting the number of participants with standing hypotension. OH was determined on the basis of a seated-to-standing protocol; supine-to-standing protocols are more sensitive and may not be interchangeable. Medications used in the trials may not reflect current medicine practice, or the trials may not have included agents thought to be more likely to affect OH and falls.

DISCLOSURES:

The study had no specific funding. Dr. Juraschek has disclosed no relevant financial relationships.

A version of this article first appeared on Medscape.com.

TOPLINE:

Intensive antihypertensive treatment provides the same benefit with regard to cardiovascular disease (CVD) and all-cause mortality regardless of the presence or absence of orthostatic or standing hypotension, new research shows.

METHODOLOGY:

• In response to ongoing concern about the benefits of intensive versus standard blood pressure treatment for adults with orthostatic hypotension (OH), researchers conducted a meta-analysis of individual patient data from nine randomized clinical trials to see whether the benefit of antihypertensive treatment was diminished for patients who had OH at baseline. Benefit was defined as a reduction in nonfatal CVD events and all-cause mortality.
• The included trials assessed BP pharmacologic treatment (more intensive BP goal or active agent) and had data on OH.

TAKEAWAY:

• The nine trials included 29,235 participants (mean age, 69 years; 48% women) who were followed for a median of 4 years; 9% had OH and 5% had standing hypotension at baseline.
• Having OH at baseline was significantly associated with the composite of CVD or all-cause mortality (hazard ratio, 1.14; 95% confidence interval, 1.04-1.26) and with all-cause mortality (HR, 1.24; 95% CI, 1.09-1.41). The same was true for baseline standing hypotension (composite outcome: HR, 1.39; 95% CI, 1.24-1.57; all-cause mortality: HR, 1.38; 95% CI, 1.14-1.66).
• More intensive BP treatment or active therapy significantly and similarly lowered risk of CVD or all-cause mortality among adults who did not have OH at baseline (HR, 0.81; 95% CI, 0.76-0.86) as well as those with OH at baseline (HR, 0.83; 95% CI, 0.70-1.00).
• More intensive BP treatment or active therapy also significantly lowered risk of CVD or all-cause mortality among those without baseline standing hypotension (HR, 0.80; 95% CI, 0.75-0.85) and nonsignificantly lowered the risk among those with baseline standing hypotension (HR, 0.94; 95% CI, 0.75-1.18).

IN PRACTICE:

“These findings suggest that orthostatic hypotension alone (that is, without symptoms) and standing hypotension measured prior to intensification of BP treatment should not deter adoption of more intensive BP treatment in adults with hypertension,” the authors conclude.

The findings should “reassure clinicians that patients with OH (and perhaps standing hypotension) will derive the full expected benefits from antihypertensive therapy,” add the authors of an accompanying editorial. “This also applies to patients treated to lower BP goals, albeit with less certainty.”

SOURCE:

The study, with first author Stephen Juraschek, MD, PhD, Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center/Harvard Medical School, Boston, and the accompanying editorial were published online in JAMA.

LIMITATIONS:

In the hypertension trials that were included in the analysis, the study populations differed, as did BP measurement procedures, interventions, duration, and CVD outcome ascertainment processes and definitions. Some trials excluded adults with low standing systolic BP, limiting the number of participants with standing hypotension. OH was determined on the basis of a seated-to-standing protocol; supine-to-standing protocols are more sensitive and may not be interchangeable. Medications used in the trials may not reflect current medicine practice, or the trials may not have included agents thought to be more likely to affect OH and falls.

DISCLOSURES:

The study had no specific funding. Dr. Juraschek has disclosed no relevant financial relationships.

A version of this article first appeared on Medscape.com.

TOPLINE:

U.S. adults with psychiatric illness experienced fewer disruptions in receiving psychotherapy following the transition to virtual psychiatric care that accompanied the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, a large study has shown.

METHODOLOGY:

• Retrospective study using electronic health records and insurance claims data from three large U.S. health systems.
• Sample included 110,089 patients with mental health conditions who attended at least two psychotherapy visits during the 9 months before and 9 months after the onset of COVID-19, defined in this study as March 14, 2020.
• Outcome was disruption in psychotherapy, defined as a gap of more than 45 days between visits.

TAKEAWAY:

• Before the pandemic, 96.9% of psychotherapy visits were in person and 35.4% were followed by a gap of more than 45 days.
• After the onset of the pandemic, more than half of visits (51.8%) were virtual, and only 17.9% were followed by a gap of more than 45 days.
• Prior to the pandemic, the median time between visits was 27 days, and after the pandemic, it dropped to 14 days, suggesting individuals were more likely to return for additional psychotherapy after the widespread shift to virtual care.
• Over the entire study period, individuals with depressive, anxiety, or bipolar disorders were more likely to maintain consistent psychotherapy visits, whereas those with schizophrenia, ADHD, autism, conduct or disruptive disorders, dementia, or personality disorders were more likely to have a disruption in their visits.

IN PRACTICE:

“These findings support continued use of virtual psychotherapy as an option for care when appropriate infrastructure is in place. In addition, these findings support the continuation of policies that provide access to and coverage for virtual psychotherapy,” the authors write.

SOURCE:

The study, led by Brian K. Ahmedani, PhD, with the Center for Health Policy and Health Services Research, Henry Ford Health, Detroit, was published online  in Psychiatric Services.

LIMITATIONS:

The study was conducted in three large health systems with virtual care infrastructure already in place. Researchers did not examine use of virtual care for medication management or for types of care other than psychotherapy, which may present different challenges.

DISCLOSURES:

The study was supported by the National Institute of Mental Health. The authors have no relevant disclosures.

A version of this article first appeared on Medscape.com.

TOPLINE:

U.S. adults with psychiatric illness experienced fewer disruptions in receiving psychotherapy following the transition to virtual psychiatric care that accompanied the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, a large study has shown.

METHODOLOGY:

• Retrospective study using electronic health records and insurance claims data from three large U.S. health systems.
• Sample included 110,089 patients with mental health conditions who attended at least two psychotherapy visits during the 9 months before and 9 months after the onset of COVID-19, defined in this study as March 14, 2020.
• Outcome was disruption in psychotherapy, defined as a gap of more than 45 days between visits.

TAKEAWAY:

• Before the pandemic, 96.9% of psychotherapy visits were in person and 35.4% were followed by a gap of more than 45 days.
• After the onset of the pandemic, more than half of visits (51.8%) were virtual, and only 17.9% were followed by a gap of more than 45 days.
• Prior to the pandemic, the median time between visits was 27 days, and after the pandemic, it dropped to 14 days, suggesting individuals were more likely to return for additional psychotherapy after the widespread shift to virtual care.
• Over the entire study period, individuals with depressive, anxiety, or bipolar disorders were more likely to maintain consistent psychotherapy visits, whereas those with schizophrenia, ADHD, autism, conduct or disruptive disorders, dementia, or personality disorders were more likely to have a disruption in their visits.

IN PRACTICE:

“These findings support continued use of virtual psychotherapy as an option for care when appropriate infrastructure is in place. In addition, these findings support the continuation of policies that provide access to and coverage for virtual psychotherapy,” the authors write.

SOURCE:

The study, led by Brian K. Ahmedani, PhD, with the Center for Health Policy and Health Services Research, Henry Ford Health, Detroit, was published online  in Psychiatric Services.

LIMITATIONS:

The study was conducted in three large health systems with virtual care infrastructure already in place. Researchers did not examine use of virtual care for medication management or for types of care other than psychotherapy, which may present different challenges.

DISCLOSURES:

The study was supported by the National Institute of Mental Health. The authors have no relevant disclosures.

A version of this article first appeared on Medscape.com.

TOPLINE:

U.S. adults with psychiatric illness experienced fewer disruptions in receiving psychotherapy following the transition to virtual psychiatric care that accompanied the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, a large study has shown.

METHODOLOGY:

• Retrospective study using electronic health records and insurance claims data from three large U.S. health systems.
• Sample included 110,089 patients with mental health conditions who attended at least two psychotherapy visits during the 9 months before and 9 months after the onset of COVID-19, defined in this study as March 14, 2020.
• Outcome was disruption in psychotherapy, defined as a gap of more than 45 days between visits.

TAKEAWAY:

• Before the pandemic, 96.9% of psychotherapy visits were in person and 35.4% were followed by a gap of more than 45 days.
• After the onset of the pandemic, more than half of visits (51.8%) were virtual, and only 17.9% were followed by a gap of more than 45 days.
• Prior to the pandemic, the median time between visits was 27 days, and after the pandemic, it dropped to 14 days, suggesting individuals were more likely to return for additional psychotherapy after the widespread shift to virtual care.
• Over the entire study period, individuals with depressive, anxiety, or bipolar disorders were more likely to maintain consistent psychotherapy visits, whereas those with schizophrenia, ADHD, autism, conduct or disruptive disorders, dementia, or personality disorders were more likely to have a disruption in their visits.

IN PRACTICE:

“These findings support continued use of virtual psychotherapy as an option for care when appropriate infrastructure is in place. In addition, these findings support the continuation of policies that provide access to and coverage for virtual psychotherapy,” the authors write.

SOURCE:

The study, led by Brian K. Ahmedani, PhD, with the Center for Health Policy and Health Services Research, Henry Ford Health, Detroit, was published online  in Psychiatric Services.

LIMITATIONS:

The study was conducted in three large health systems with virtual care infrastructure already in place. Researchers did not examine use of virtual care for medication management or for types of care other than psychotherapy, which may present different challenges.

DISCLOSURES:

The study was supported by the National Institute of Mental Health. The authors have no relevant disclosures.

A version of this article first appeared on Medscape.com.

WASHINGTON – The entire video clip is just 15 seconds — 15 seconds that went viral and temporarily upended the entire life and disrupted the medical practice of Nicole Baldwin, MD, a pediatrician in Cincinnati, Ohio, in January 2020. At the annual meeting of the American Academy of Pediatrics, Dr. Baldwin told attendees how her pro-vaccine TikTok video led a horde of anti-vaccine activists to swarm her social media profiles across multiple platforms, leave one-star reviews with false stories about her medical practice on various doctor review sites, and personally threaten her.

The initial response to the video was positive, with 50,000 views in the first 24 hours after the video was posted and more than 1.5 million views the next day. But 2 days after the video was posted, an organized attack that originated on Facebook required Dr. Baldwin to enlist the help of 16 volunteers, working 24/7 for a week, to help ban and block more than 6,000 users on Facebook, Instagram, and TikTok. Just 4 days after she’d posted the video, Dr. Baldwin was reporting personal threats to the police and had begun contacting sites such as Yelp, Google, Healthgrades, Vitals, RateMDs, and WebMD so they could start removing false reviews about her practice.

Today, years after those 2 exhausting, intense weeks of attacks, Dr. Baldwin has found two silver linings in the experience: More people have found her profiles, allowing her to share evidence-based information with an even wider audience, and she can now help other physicians protect themselves and reduce the risk of similar attacks, or at least know how to respond to them if they occur. Dr. Baldwin shared a wealth of tips and resources during her lecture to help pediatricians prepare ahead for the possibility that they will be targeted next, whether the issue is vaccines or another topic.
 

Online risks and benefits

A Pew survey of U.S. adults in September 2020 found that 41% have personally experienced online harassment, including a quarter of Americans who have experienced severe harassment. More than half of respondents said online harassment and bullying is a major problem – and that was a poll of the entire population, not even just physicians and scientists.

“Now, these numbers would be higher,” Dr. Baldwin said. “A lot has changed in the past 3 years, and the landscape is very different.”

The pandemic contributed to those changes to the landscape, including an increase in harassment of doctors and researchers. A June 2023 study revealed that two-thirds of 359 respondents in an online survey reported harassment on social media, a substantial number even after accounting for selection bias in the individuals who chose to respond to the survey. Although most of the attacks (88%) resulted from the respondent’s advocacy online, nearly half the attacks (45%) were gender based, 27% were based on race/ethnicity, and 13% were based on sexual orientation.

While hateful comments are likely the most common type of online harassment, other types can involve sharing or tagging your profile, creating fake profiles to misrepresent you, fake reviews of your practice, harassing phone calls and hate mail at your office, and doxxing, in which someone online widely shares your personal address, phone number, email, or other contact information.

Despite the risks of all these forms of harassment, Dr. Baldwin emphasized the value of doctors having a social media presence given how much misinformation thrives online. For example, a recent report from the Kaiser Family Foundation revealed how many people weren’t sure whether certain health misinformation claims were true or false. Barely a third of people were sure that COVID-19 vaccines had not caused thousands of deaths in healthy people, and only 22% of people were sure that ivermectin is not an effective treatment for COVID.

“There is so much that we need to be doing and working in these spaces to put evidence-based content out there so that people are not finding all of this crap from everybody else,” Dr. Baldwin said. Having an online presence is particularly important given that the public still has high levels of trust in their doctors, she added.

“They trust their physician, and you may not be their physician online, but I will tell you from experience, when you build a community of followers, you become that trusted source of information for them, and it is so important,” Dr. Baldwin said. “There is room for everybody in this space, and we need all of you.”
 

Proactive steps for protection

Dr. Baldwin then went through the details of what people should do now to make things easier in the event of an attack later. “The best defense is a good offense,” Dr. Baldwin said, “so make sure all of your accounts are secure.”

She recommended the following steps:

• Use two-factor authentication for all of your logins.
• Use strong, unique passwords for all of your logins.
• Use strong privacy settings on all of your private social media profiles, such as making sure photos are not visible on your personal Facebook account.
• Claim your Google profile and Yelp business profile.
• Claim your doctor and/or business profile on all of the medical review sites where you have one, including Google, Healthgrades, Vitals, RateMDs, and WebMD.

For doctors who are attacked specifically because of pro-vaccine advocacy, Dr. Baldwin recommended contacting Shots Heard Round The World, a site that was created by a physician whose practice was attacked by anti-vaccine activists. The site also has a toolkit that anyone can download for tips on preparing ahead for possible attacks and what to do if you are attacked.

Dr. Baldwin then reviewed how to set up different social media profiles to automatically hide certain comments, including comments with words commonly used by online harassers and trolls:

• Sheep
• Sheeple
• Pharma
• Shill
• Die
• Psychopath
• Clown
• Various curse words
• The clown emoji

In Instagram, go to “Settings and privacy —> Hidden Words” for options on hiding offensive comments and messages and for managing custom words and phrases that should be automatically hidden.

On Facebook, go to “Professional dashboard —> Moderation Assist,” where you can add or edit criteria to automatically hide comments on your Facebook page. In addition to hiding comments with certain keywords, you can hide comments from new accounts, accounts without profile photos, or accounts with no friends or followers.

On TikTok, click the three-line menu icon in the upper right, and choose “Privacy —> Comments —> Filter keywords.”

On the platform formerly known as Twitter, go to “Settings and privacy —> Privacy and safety —> Mute and block —> Muted words.”

On YouTube, under “Manage your community & comments,” select “Learn about comment settings.”

Dr. Baldwin did not discourage doctors from posting about controversial topics, but she said it’s important to know what they are so that you can be prepared for the possibility that a post about one of these topics could lead to online harassment. These hot button topics include vaccines, firearm safety, gender-affirming care, reproductive choice, safe sleep/bedsharing, breastfeeding, and COVID masks.

If you do post on one of these and suspect it could result in harassment, Dr. Baldwin recommends turning on your notifications so you know when attacks begin, alerting your office and call center staff if you think they might receive calls, and, when possible, post your content at a time when you’re more likely to be able to monitor the post. She acknowledged that this last tip isn’t always relevant since attacks can take a few days to start or gain steam.
 

Defending yourself in an attack

Even after taking all these precautions, it’s not possible to altogether prevent an attack from happening, so Dr. Baldwin provided suggestions on what to do if one occurs, starting with taking a deep breath.

“If you are attacked, first of all, please remain calm, which is a lot easier said than done,” she said. “But know that this too shall pass. These things do come to an end.”

She advises you to get help if you need it, enlisting friends or colleagues to help with moderation and banning/blocking. If necessary, alert your employer to the attack, as attackers may contact your employer. Some people may opt to turn off comments on their post, but doing so “is a really personal decision,” she said. It’s okay to turn off comments if you don’t have the bandwidth or help to deal with them.

However, Dr. Baldwin said she never turns off comments because she wants to be able to ban and block people to reduce the likelihood of a future attack from them, and each comment brings the post higher in the algorithm so that more people are able to see the original content. “So sometimes these things are actually a blessing in disguise,” she said.

If you do have comments turned on, take screenshots of the most egregious or threatening ones and then report them and ban/block them. The screenshots are evidence since blocking will remove the comment.

“Take breaks when you need to,” she said. “Don’t stay up all night” since there are only going to be more in the morning, and if you’re using keywords to help hide many of these comments, that will hide them from your followers while you’re away. She also advised monitoring your online reviews at doctor/practice review sites so you know whether you’re receiving spurious reviews that need to be removed.

Dr. Baldwin also addressed how to handle trolls, the people online who intentionally antagonize others with inflammatory, irrelevant, offensive, or otherwise disruptive comments or content. The No. 1 rule is not to engage – “Don’t feed the trolls” – but Dr. Baldwin acknowledged that she can find that difficult sometimes. So she uses kindness or humor to defuse them or calls them out on their inaccurate information and then thanks them for their engagement. Don’t forget that you are in charge of your own page, so any complaints about “censorship” or infringing “free speech” aren’t relevant.

If the comments are growing out of control and you’re unable to manage them, multiple social media platforms have options for limited interactions or who can comment on your page.

On Instagram under “Settings and privacy,” check out “Limited interactions,” “Comments —> Allow comments from,” and “Tags and mentions” to see ways you can limit who is able to comment, tag or mention your account. If you need a complete break, you can turn off commenting by clicking the three dots in the upper right corner of the post, or make your account temporarily private under “Settings and privacy —> Account privacy.”

On Facebook, click the three dots in the upper right corner of posts to select “Who can comment on your post?” Also, under “Settings —> Privacy —> Your Activity,” you can adjust who sees your future posts. Again, if things are out of control, you can temporarily deactivate your page under “Settings —> Privacy —> Facebook Page information.”

On TikTok, click the three lines in the upper right corner of your profile and select “Privacy —> Comments” to adjust who can comment and to filter comments. Again, you can make your account private under “Settings and privacy —> Privacy —> Private account.”

On the platform formerly known as Twitter, click the three dots in the upper right corner of the tweet to change who can reply to the tweet. If you select “Only people you mentioned,” then no one can reply if you did not mention anyone. You can control tagging under “Settings and privacy —> Privacy and safety —> Audience and tagging.”

If you or your practice receive false reviews on review sites, report the reviews and alert the rating site when you can. In the meantime, lock down your private social media accounts and ensure that no photos of your family are publicly available.
 

Social media self-care

Dr. Baldwin acknowledged that experiencing a social media attack can be intense and even frightening, but it’s rare and outweighed by the “hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of positive comments all the time.” She also reminded attendees that being on social media doesn’t mean being there all the time.

“Over time, my use of social media has certainly changed. It ebbs and flows,” she said. “There are times when I have a lot of bandwidth and I’m posting a lot, and then I actually have had some struggles with my own mental health, with some anxiety and mild depression, so I took a break from social media for a while. When I came back, I posted about my mental health struggles, and you wouldn’t believe how many people were so appreciative of that.”
 

Accurate information from a trusted source

Ultimately, Dr. Baldwin sees her work online as an extension of her work educating patients.

“This is where our patients are. They are in your office for maybe 10-15 minutes maybe once a year, but they are on these platforms every single day for hours,” she said. “They need to see this information from medical professionals because there are random people out there that are telling them [misinformation].”

Elizabeth Murray, DO, MBA, an emergency medicine pediatrician at Golisano Children’s Hospital at the University of Rochester, agreed that there’s substantial value in doctors sharing accurate information online.

“Disinformation and misinformation is rampant, and at the end of the day, we know the facts,” Dr. Murray said. “We know what parents want to hear and what they want to learn about, so we need to share that information and get the facts out there.”

Dr. Murray found the session very helpful because there’s so much to learn across different social media platforms and it can feel overwhelming if you aren’t familiar with the tools.

“Social media is always going to be here. We need to learn to live with all of these platforms,” Dr. Murray said. “That’s a skill set. We need to learn the skills and teach our kids the skill set. You never really know what you might put out there that, in your mind is innocent or very science-based, that for whatever reason somebody might take issue with. You might as well be ready because we’re all about prevention in pediatrics.”

There were no funders for the presentation. Dr. Baldwin and Dr. Murray had no disclosures.

WASHINGTON – The entire video clip is just 15 seconds — 15 seconds that went viral and temporarily upended the entire life and disrupted the medical practice of Nicole Baldwin, MD, a pediatrician in Cincinnati, Ohio, in January 2020. At the annual meeting of the American Academy of Pediatrics, Dr. Baldwin told attendees how her pro-vaccine TikTok video led a horde of anti-vaccine activists to swarm her social media profiles across multiple platforms, leave one-star reviews with false stories about her medical practice on various doctor review sites, and personally threaten her.

The initial response to the video was positive, with 50,000 views in the first 24 hours after the video was posted and more than 1.5 million views the next day. But 2 days after the video was posted, an organized attack that originated on Facebook required Dr. Baldwin to enlist the help of 16 volunteers, working 24/7 for a week, to help ban and block more than 6,000 users on Facebook, Instagram, and TikTok. Just 4 days after she’d posted the video, Dr. Baldwin was reporting personal threats to the police and had begun contacting sites such as Yelp, Google, Healthgrades, Vitals, RateMDs, and WebMD so they could start removing false reviews about her practice.

Today, years after those 2 exhausting, intense weeks of attacks, Dr. Baldwin has found two silver linings in the experience: More people have found her profiles, allowing her to share evidence-based information with an even wider audience, and she can now help other physicians protect themselves and reduce the risk of similar attacks, or at least know how to respond to them if they occur. Dr. Baldwin shared a wealth of tips and resources during her lecture to help pediatricians prepare ahead for the possibility that they will be targeted next, whether the issue is vaccines or another topic.
 

Online risks and benefits

A Pew survey of U.S. adults in September 2020 found that 41% have personally experienced online harassment, including a quarter of Americans who have experienced severe harassment. More than half of respondents said online harassment and bullying is a major problem – and that was a poll of the entire population, not even just physicians and scientists.

“Now, these numbers would be higher,” Dr. Baldwin said. “A lot has changed in the past 3 years, and the landscape is very different.”

The pandemic contributed to those changes to the landscape, including an increase in harassment of doctors and researchers. A June 2023 study revealed that two-thirds of 359 respondents in an online survey reported harassment on social media, a substantial number even after accounting for selection bias in the individuals who chose to respond to the survey. Although most of the attacks (88%) resulted from the respondent’s advocacy online, nearly half the attacks (45%) were gender based, 27% were based on race/ethnicity, and 13% were based on sexual orientation.

While hateful comments are likely the most common type of online harassment, other types can involve sharing or tagging your profile, creating fake profiles to misrepresent you, fake reviews of your practice, harassing phone calls and hate mail at your office, and doxxing, in which someone online widely shares your personal address, phone number, email, or other contact information.

Despite the risks of all these forms of harassment, Dr. Baldwin emphasized the value of doctors having a social media presence given how much misinformation thrives online. For example, a recent report from the Kaiser Family Foundation revealed how many people weren’t sure whether certain health misinformation claims were true or false. Barely a third of people were sure that COVID-19 vaccines had not caused thousands of deaths in healthy people, and only 22% of people were sure that ivermectin is not an effective treatment for COVID.

“There is so much that we need to be doing and working in these spaces to put evidence-based content out there so that people are not finding all of this crap from everybody else,” Dr. Baldwin said. Having an online presence is particularly important given that the public still has high levels of trust in their doctors, she added.

“They trust their physician, and you may not be their physician online, but I will tell you from experience, when you build a community of followers, you become that trusted source of information for them, and it is so important,” Dr. Baldwin said. “There is room for everybody in this space, and we need all of you.”
 

Proactive steps for protection

Dr. Baldwin then went through the details of what people should do now to make things easier in the event of an attack later. “The best defense is a good offense,” Dr. Baldwin said, “so make sure all of your accounts are secure.”

She recommended the following steps:

• Use two-factor authentication for all of your logins.
• Use strong, unique passwords for all of your logins.
• Use strong privacy settings on all of your private social media profiles, such as making sure photos are not visible on your personal Facebook account.
• Claim your Google profile and Yelp business profile.
• Claim your doctor and/or business profile on all of the medical review sites where you have one, including Google, Healthgrades, Vitals, RateMDs, and WebMD.

For doctors who are attacked specifically because of pro-vaccine advocacy, Dr. Baldwin recommended contacting Shots Heard Round The World, a site that was created by a physician whose practice was attacked by anti-vaccine activists. The site also has a toolkit that anyone can download for tips on preparing ahead for possible attacks and what to do if you are attacked.

Dr. Baldwin then reviewed how to set up different social media profiles to automatically hide certain comments, including comments with words commonly used by online harassers and trolls:

• Sheep
• Sheeple
• Pharma
• Shill
• Die
• Psychopath
• Clown
• Various curse words
• The clown emoji

In Instagram, go to “Settings and privacy —> Hidden Words” for options on hiding offensive comments and messages and for managing custom words and phrases that should be automatically hidden.

On Facebook, go to “Professional dashboard —> Moderation Assist,” where you can add or edit criteria to automatically hide comments on your Facebook page. In addition to hiding comments with certain keywords, you can hide comments from new accounts, accounts without profile photos, or accounts with no friends or followers.

On TikTok, click the three-line menu icon in the upper right, and choose “Privacy —> Comments —> Filter keywords.”

On the platform formerly known as Twitter, go to “Settings and privacy —> Privacy and safety —> Mute and block —> Muted words.”

On YouTube, under “Manage your community & comments,” select “Learn about comment settings.”

Dr. Baldwin did not discourage doctors from posting about controversial topics, but she said it’s important to know what they are so that you can be prepared for the possibility that a post about one of these topics could lead to online harassment. These hot button topics include vaccines, firearm safety, gender-affirming care, reproductive choice, safe sleep/bedsharing, breastfeeding, and COVID masks.

If you do post on one of these and suspect it could result in harassment, Dr. Baldwin recommends turning on your notifications so you know when attacks begin, alerting your office and call center staff if you think they might receive calls, and, when possible, post your content at a time when you’re more likely to be able to monitor the post. She acknowledged that this last tip isn’t always relevant since attacks can take a few days to start or gain steam.
 

Defending yourself in an attack

Even after taking all these precautions, it’s not possible to altogether prevent an attack from happening, so Dr. Baldwin provided suggestions on what to do if one occurs, starting with taking a deep breath.

“If you are attacked, first of all, please remain calm, which is a lot easier said than done,” she said. “But know that this too shall pass. These things do come to an end.”

She advises you to get help if you need it, enlisting friends or colleagues to help with moderation and banning/blocking. If necessary, alert your employer to the attack, as attackers may contact your employer. Some people may opt to turn off comments on their post, but doing so “is a really personal decision,” she said. It’s okay to turn off comments if you don’t have the bandwidth or help to deal with them.

However, Dr. Baldwin said she never turns off comments because she wants to be able to ban and block people to reduce the likelihood of a future attack from them, and each comment brings the post higher in the algorithm so that more people are able to see the original content. “So sometimes these things are actually a blessing in disguise,” she said.

If you do have comments turned on, take screenshots of the most egregious or threatening ones and then report them and ban/block them. The screenshots are evidence since blocking will remove the comment.

“Take breaks when you need to,” she said. “Don’t stay up all night” since there are only going to be more in the morning, and if you’re using keywords to help hide many of these comments, that will hide them from your followers while you’re away. She also advised monitoring your online reviews at doctor/practice review sites so you know whether you’re receiving spurious reviews that need to be removed.

Dr. Baldwin also addressed how to handle trolls, the people online who intentionally antagonize others with inflammatory, irrelevant, offensive, or otherwise disruptive comments or content. The No. 1 rule is not to engage – “Don’t feed the trolls” – but Dr. Baldwin acknowledged that she can find that difficult sometimes. So she uses kindness or humor to defuse them or calls them out on their inaccurate information and then thanks them for their engagement. Don’t forget that you are in charge of your own page, so any complaints about “censorship” or infringing “free speech” aren’t relevant.

If the comments are growing out of control and you’re unable to manage them, multiple social media platforms have options for limited interactions or who can comment on your page.

On Instagram under “Settings and privacy,” check out “Limited interactions,” “Comments —> Allow comments from,” and “Tags and mentions” to see ways you can limit who is able to comment, tag or mention your account. If you need a complete break, you can turn off commenting by clicking the three dots in the upper right corner of the post, or make your account temporarily private under “Settings and privacy —> Account privacy.”

On Facebook, click the three dots in the upper right corner of posts to select “Who can comment on your post?” Also, under “Settings —> Privacy —> Your Activity,” you can adjust who sees your future posts. Again, if things are out of control, you can temporarily deactivate your page under “Settings —> Privacy —> Facebook Page information.”

On TikTok, click the three lines in the upper right corner of your profile and select “Privacy —> Comments” to adjust who can comment and to filter comments. Again, you can make your account private under “Settings and privacy —> Privacy —> Private account.”

On the platform formerly known as Twitter, click the three dots in the upper right corner of the tweet to change who can reply to the tweet. If you select “Only people you mentioned,” then no one can reply if you did not mention anyone. You can control tagging under “Settings and privacy —> Privacy and safety —> Audience and tagging.”

If you or your practice receive false reviews on review sites, report the reviews and alert the rating site when you can. In the meantime, lock down your private social media accounts and ensure that no photos of your family are publicly available.
 

Social media self-care

Dr. Baldwin acknowledged that experiencing a social media attack can be intense and even frightening, but it’s rare and outweighed by the “hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of positive comments all the time.” She also reminded attendees that being on social media doesn’t mean being there all the time.

“Over time, my use of social media has certainly changed. It ebbs and flows,” she said. “There are times when I have a lot of bandwidth and I’m posting a lot, and then I actually have had some struggles with my own mental health, with some anxiety and mild depression, so I took a break from social media for a while. When I came back, I posted about my mental health struggles, and you wouldn’t believe how many people were so appreciative of that.”
 

Accurate information from a trusted source

Ultimately, Dr. Baldwin sees her work online as an extension of her work educating patients.

“This is where our patients are. They are in your office for maybe 10-15 minutes maybe once a year, but they are on these platforms every single day for hours,” she said. “They need to see this information from medical professionals because there are random people out there that are telling them [misinformation].”

Elizabeth Murray, DO, MBA, an emergency medicine pediatrician at Golisano Children’s Hospital at the University of Rochester, agreed that there’s substantial value in doctors sharing accurate information online.

“Disinformation and misinformation is rampant, and at the end of the day, we know the facts,” Dr. Murray said. “We know what parents want to hear and what they want to learn about, so we need to share that information and get the facts out there.”

Dr. Murray found the session very helpful because there’s so much to learn across different social media platforms and it can feel overwhelming if you aren’t familiar with the tools.

“Social media is always going to be here. We need to learn to live with all of these platforms,” Dr. Murray said. “That’s a skill set. We need to learn the skills and teach our kids the skill set. You never really know what you might put out there that, in your mind is innocent or very science-based, that for whatever reason somebody might take issue with. You might as well be ready because we’re all about prevention in pediatrics.”

There were no funders for the presentation. Dr. Baldwin and Dr. Murray had no disclosures.

WASHINGTON – The entire video clip is just 15 seconds — 15 seconds that went viral and temporarily upended the entire life and disrupted the medical practice of Nicole Baldwin, MD, a pediatrician in Cincinnati, Ohio, in January 2020. At the annual meeting of the American Academy of Pediatrics, Dr. Baldwin told attendees how her pro-vaccine TikTok video led a horde of anti-vaccine activists to swarm her social media profiles across multiple platforms, leave one-star reviews with false stories about her medical practice on various doctor review sites, and personally threaten her.

The initial response to the video was positive, with 50,000 views in the first 24 hours after the video was posted and more than 1.5 million views the next day. But 2 days after the video was posted, an organized attack that originated on Facebook required Dr. Baldwin to enlist the help of 16 volunteers, working 24/7 for a week, to help ban and block more than 6,000 users on Facebook, Instagram, and TikTok. Just 4 days after she’d posted the video, Dr. Baldwin was reporting personal threats to the police and had begun contacting sites such as Yelp, Google, Healthgrades, Vitals, RateMDs, and WebMD so they could start removing false reviews about her practice.

Today, years after those 2 exhausting, intense weeks of attacks, Dr. Baldwin has found two silver linings in the experience: More people have found her profiles, allowing her to share evidence-based information with an even wider audience, and she can now help other physicians protect themselves and reduce the risk of similar attacks, or at least know how to respond to them if they occur. Dr. Baldwin shared a wealth of tips and resources during her lecture to help pediatricians prepare ahead for the possibility that they will be targeted next, whether the issue is vaccines or another topic.
 

Online risks and benefits

A Pew survey of U.S. adults in September 2020 found that 41% have personally experienced online harassment, including a quarter of Americans who have experienced severe harassment. More than half of respondents said online harassment and bullying is a major problem – and that was a poll of the entire population, not even just physicians and scientists.

“Now, these numbers would be higher,” Dr. Baldwin said. “A lot has changed in the past 3 years, and the landscape is very different.”

The pandemic contributed to those changes to the landscape, including an increase in harassment of doctors and researchers. A June 2023 study revealed that two-thirds of 359 respondents in an online survey reported harassment on social media, a substantial number even after accounting for selection bias in the individuals who chose to respond to the survey. Although most of the attacks (88%) resulted from the respondent’s advocacy online, nearly half the attacks (45%) were gender based, 27% were based on race/ethnicity, and 13% were based on sexual orientation.

While hateful comments are likely the most common type of online harassment, other types can involve sharing or tagging your profile, creating fake profiles to misrepresent you, fake reviews of your practice, harassing phone calls and hate mail at your office, and doxxing, in which someone online widely shares your personal address, phone number, email, or other contact information.

Despite the risks of all these forms of harassment, Dr. Baldwin emphasized the value of doctors having a social media presence given how much misinformation thrives online. For example, a recent report from the Kaiser Family Foundation revealed how many people weren’t sure whether certain health misinformation claims were true or false. Barely a third of people were sure that COVID-19 vaccines had not caused thousands of deaths in healthy people, and only 22% of people were sure that ivermectin is not an effective treatment for COVID.

“There is so much that we need to be doing and working in these spaces to put evidence-based content out there so that people are not finding all of this crap from everybody else,” Dr. Baldwin said. Having an online presence is particularly important given that the public still has high levels of trust in their doctors, she added.

“They trust their physician, and you may not be their physician online, but I will tell you from experience, when you build a community of followers, you become that trusted source of information for them, and it is so important,” Dr. Baldwin said. “There is room for everybody in this space, and we need all of you.”
 

Proactive steps for protection

Dr. Baldwin then went through the details of what people should do now to make things easier in the event of an attack later. “The best defense is a good offense,” Dr. Baldwin said, “so make sure all of your accounts are secure.”

She recommended the following steps:

• Use two-factor authentication for all of your logins.
• Use strong, unique passwords for all of your logins.
• Use strong privacy settings on all of your private social media profiles, such as making sure photos are not visible on your personal Facebook account.
• Claim your Google profile and Yelp business profile.
• Claim your doctor and/or business profile on all of the medical review sites where you have one, including Google, Healthgrades, Vitals, RateMDs, and WebMD.

For doctors who are attacked specifically because of pro-vaccine advocacy, Dr. Baldwin recommended contacting Shots Heard Round The World, a site that was created by a physician whose practice was attacked by anti-vaccine activists. The site also has a toolkit that anyone can download for tips on preparing ahead for possible attacks and what to do if you are attacked.

Dr. Baldwin then reviewed how to set up different social media profiles to automatically hide certain comments, including comments with words commonly used by online harassers and trolls:

• Sheep
• Sheeple
• Pharma
• Shill
• Die
• Psychopath
• Clown
• Various curse words
• The clown emoji

In Instagram, go to “Settings and privacy —> Hidden Words” for options on hiding offensive comments and messages and for managing custom words and phrases that should be automatically hidden.

On Facebook, go to “Professional dashboard —> Moderation Assist,” where you can add or edit criteria to automatically hide comments on your Facebook page. In addition to hiding comments with certain keywords, you can hide comments from new accounts, accounts without profile photos, or accounts with no friends or followers.

On TikTok, click the three-line menu icon in the upper right, and choose “Privacy —> Comments —> Filter keywords.”

On the platform formerly known as Twitter, go to “Settings and privacy —> Privacy and safety —> Mute and block —> Muted words.”

On YouTube, under “Manage your community & comments,” select “Learn about comment settings.”

Dr. Baldwin did not discourage doctors from posting about controversial topics, but she said it’s important to know what they are so that you can be prepared for the possibility that a post about one of these topics could lead to online harassment. These hot button topics include vaccines, firearm safety, gender-affirming care, reproductive choice, safe sleep/bedsharing, breastfeeding, and COVID masks.

If you do post on one of these and suspect it could result in harassment, Dr. Baldwin recommends turning on your notifications so you know when attacks begin, alerting your office and call center staff if you think they might receive calls, and, when possible, post your content at a time when you’re more likely to be able to monitor the post. She acknowledged that this last tip isn’t always relevant since attacks can take a few days to start or gain steam.
 

Defending yourself in an attack

Even after taking all these precautions, it’s not possible to altogether prevent an attack from happening, so Dr. Baldwin provided suggestions on what to do if one occurs, starting with taking a deep breath.

“If you are attacked, first of all, please remain calm, which is a lot easier said than done,” she said. “But know that this too shall pass. These things do come to an end.”

She advises you to get help if you need it, enlisting friends or colleagues to help with moderation and banning/blocking. If necessary, alert your employer to the attack, as attackers may contact your employer. Some people may opt to turn off comments on their post, but doing so “is a really personal decision,” she said. It’s okay to turn off comments if you don’t have the bandwidth or help to deal with them.

However, Dr. Baldwin said she never turns off comments because she wants to be able to ban and block people to reduce the likelihood of a future attack from them, and each comment brings the post higher in the algorithm so that more people are able to see the original content. “So sometimes these things are actually a blessing in disguise,” she said.

If you do have comments turned on, take screenshots of the most egregious or threatening ones and then report them and ban/block them. The screenshots are evidence since blocking will remove the comment.

“Take breaks when you need to,” she said. “Don’t stay up all night” since there are only going to be more in the morning, and if you’re using keywords to help hide many of these comments, that will hide them from your followers while you’re away. She also advised monitoring your online reviews at doctor/practice review sites so you know whether you’re receiving spurious reviews that need to be removed.

Dr. Baldwin also addressed how to handle trolls, the people online who intentionally antagonize others with inflammatory, irrelevant, offensive, or otherwise disruptive comments or content. The No. 1 rule is not to engage – “Don’t feed the trolls” – but Dr. Baldwin acknowledged that she can find that difficult sometimes. So she uses kindness or humor to defuse them or calls them out on their inaccurate information and then thanks them for their engagement. Don’t forget that you are in charge of your own page, so any complaints about “censorship” or infringing “free speech” aren’t relevant.

If the comments are growing out of control and you’re unable to manage them, multiple social media platforms have options for limited interactions or who can comment on your page.

On Instagram under “Settings and privacy,” check out “Limited interactions,” “Comments —> Allow comments from,” and “Tags and mentions” to see ways you can limit who is able to comment, tag or mention your account. If you need a complete break, you can turn off commenting by clicking the three dots in the upper right corner of the post, or make your account temporarily private under “Settings and privacy —> Account privacy.”

On Facebook, click the three dots in the upper right corner of posts to select “Who can comment on your post?” Also, under “Settings —> Privacy —> Your Activity,” you can adjust who sees your future posts. Again, if things are out of control, you can temporarily deactivate your page under “Settings —> Privacy —> Facebook Page information.”

On TikTok, click the three lines in the upper right corner of your profile and select “Privacy —> Comments” to adjust who can comment and to filter comments. Again, you can make your account private under “Settings and privacy —> Privacy —> Private account.”

On the platform formerly known as Twitter, click the three dots in the upper right corner of the tweet to change who can reply to the tweet. If you select “Only people you mentioned,” then no one can reply if you did not mention anyone. You can control tagging under “Settings and privacy —> Privacy and safety —> Audience and tagging.”

If you or your practice receive false reviews on review sites, report the reviews and alert the rating site when you can. In the meantime, lock down your private social media accounts and ensure that no photos of your family are publicly available.
 

Social media self-care

Dr. Baldwin acknowledged that experiencing a social media attack can be intense and even frightening, but it’s rare and outweighed by the “hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of positive comments all the time.” She also reminded attendees that being on social media doesn’t mean being there all the time.

“Over time, my use of social media has certainly changed. It ebbs and flows,” she said. “There are times when I have a lot of bandwidth and I’m posting a lot, and then I actually have had some struggles with my own mental health, with some anxiety and mild depression, so I took a break from social media for a while. When I came back, I posted about my mental health struggles, and you wouldn’t believe how many people were so appreciative of that.”
 

Accurate information from a trusted source

Ultimately, Dr. Baldwin sees her work online as an extension of her work educating patients.

“This is where our patients are. They are in your office for maybe 10-15 minutes maybe once a year, but they are on these platforms every single day for hours,” she said. “They need to see this information from medical professionals because there are random people out there that are telling them [misinformation].”

Elizabeth Murray, DO, MBA, an emergency medicine pediatrician at Golisano Children’s Hospital at the University of Rochester, agreed that there’s substantial value in doctors sharing accurate information online.

“Disinformation and misinformation is rampant, and at the end of the day, we know the facts,” Dr. Murray said. “We know what parents want to hear and what they want to learn about, so we need to share that information and get the facts out there.”

Dr. Murray found the session very helpful because there’s so much to learn across different social media platforms and it can feel overwhelming if you aren’t familiar with the tools.

“Social media is always going to be here. We need to learn to live with all of these platforms,” Dr. Murray said. “That’s a skill set. We need to learn the skills and teach our kids the skill set. You never really know what you might put out there that, in your mind is innocent or very science-based, that for whatever reason somebody might take issue with. You might as well be ready because we’re all about prevention in pediatrics.”

There were no funders for the presentation. Dr. Baldwin and Dr. Murray had no disclosures.

Which conditions are caused by infection? Though it may seem like an amateur concern in the era of advanced microscopy, some culprits evade conventional methods of detection. Large medical databases hold the power to unlock answers. 

A recent study from Sweden and Denmark meticulously traced the lives and medical histories of nearly one million men and women in those countries who had received blood transfusions over nearly five decades. Some of these patients later experienced brain bleeds. The inescapable question: Could a virus found in some donor blood have caused the hemorrhages?

Traditionally, brain bleeds have been thought to strike at random. But the new study, published in JAMA, points toward an infection that causes or, at the very least, is linked to the condition. The researchers used a large databank to make the discovery. 

“As health data becomes more available and easier to analyze, we’ll see all kinds of cases like this,” said Jingcheng Zhao, MD, of the clinical epidemiology division of Sweden’s Karolinska Institutet in Solna and lead author of the study.

Scientists say the field of medical research is on the cusp of a revolution as immense health databases guide discovery and improve clinical care. 

“If you can aggregate data, you have the statistical power to identify associations,” said David R. Crosslin, PhD, professor in the division of biomedical informatics and genomics at Tulane University in New Orleans. “It opens up the world for understanding diseases.”

With access to the large database, Dr. Zhao and his team found that some blood donors later experienced brain bleeds. And it turned out that the recipients of blood from those same donors carried the highest risk of experiencing a brain bleed later in life. Meanwhile, patients whose donors remained bleed-free had the lowest risk.
 

Not so fast in the United States

In Nordic countries, all hospitals, clinics, and pharmacies report data on diagnoses and health care visits to the government, tracking that began with paper and pen in the 1960s. But the United States health care system is too fragmented to replicate such efforts, with several brands of electronic medical records operating across different systems. Data sharing across institutions is minimal. 

Most comparable health data in the United States comes from reimbursement information collected by the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services on government-sponsored insurance programs.

“We would need all the health care systems in the country to operate within the same IT system or use the same data model,” said Euan Ashley, MD, PhD, professor of genomics at Stanford (Calif.) University. “It’s an exciting prospect. But I think [the United States] is one of the last countries where it’ll happen.”

States, meanwhile, collect health data on specific areas like sexually transmitted infection cases and rates. Other states have registries, like the Connecticut Tumor Registry, which was established in 1941 and is the oldest population-based cancer registry in the world.

But all of these efforts are ad hoc, and no equivalent exists for heart disease and other conditions.

Health data companies have recently entered the U.S. data industry mainly through partnerships with health systems and insurance companies, using deidentified information from patient charts.

The large databases have yielded important findings that randomized clinical trials simply cannot, according to Dr. Ashley.

For instance, a study found that a heavily-lauded immunotherapy treatment did not provide meaningful outcomes for patients aged 75 years or older, but it did for younger patients.

This sort of analysis might enable clinicians to administer treatments based on how effective they are for patients with particular demographics, according to Cary Gross, MD, professor at Yale University in New Haven, Conn.

“From a bedside standpoint, these large databases can identify who benefits from what,” Dr. Gross said. “Precision medicine is not just about genetic tailoring.” These large datasets also provide insight into genetic and environmental variables that contribute to disease. 

For instance, the UK Biobank has more than 500,000 participants paired with their medical records and scans of their body and brain. Researchers perform cognitive tests on participants and extract DNA from blood samples over their lifetime, allowing examination of interactions between risk factors. 

A similar but much smaller-scale effort underway in the United States, called the All of Us Research Program, has enrolled more than 650,000 people, less than one-third the size of the UK Biobank by relative populations. The goal of the program is to provide insights into prevention and treatment of chronic disease among a diverse set of at least one million participants. The database includes information on sexual orientation, which is a fairly new datapoint collected by researchers in an effort to study health outcomes and inequities among the LGBTQ+ community.

Dr. Crosslin and his colleagues are writing a grant proposal to use the All of Us database to identify genetic risks for preeclampsia. People with certain genetic profiles may be predisposed to the life-threatening condition, and researchers may discover that lifestyle changes could decrease risk, Dr. Crosslin said. 
 

Changes in the United States

The COVID-19 pandemic exposed the lack of centralized data in the United States because a majority of research on the virus has been conducted abroad in countries with national health care systems and these large databases. 

The U.S. gap spurred a group of researchers to create the National Institutes of Health–funded National COVID Cohort Collaborative (N3C), a project that gathers medical records from millions of patients across health systems and provides access to research teams investigating a wide spectrum of topics, such as optimal timing for ventilator use.

But until government or private health systems develop a way to share and regulate health data ethically and efficiently, significant limits will persist on what large-scale databases can do, Dr. Gross said. 

“At the federal level, we need to ensure this health information is made available for public health researchers so we don’t create these private fiefdoms of data,” Dr. Gross said. “Things have to be transparent. I think our country needs to take a step back and think about what we’re doing with our health data and how we can make sure it’s being managed ethically.”

A version of this article first appeared on Medscape.com.

Which conditions are caused by infection? Though it may seem like an amateur concern in the era of advanced microscopy, some culprits evade conventional methods of detection. Large medical databases hold the power to unlock answers. 

A recent study from Sweden and Denmark meticulously traced the lives and medical histories of nearly one million men and women in those countries who had received blood transfusions over nearly five decades. Some of these patients later experienced brain bleeds. The inescapable question: Could a virus found in some donor blood have caused the hemorrhages?

Traditionally, brain bleeds have been thought to strike at random. But the new study, published in JAMA, points toward an infection that causes or, at the very least, is linked to the condition. The researchers used a large databank to make the discovery. 

“As health data becomes more available and easier to analyze, we’ll see all kinds of cases like this,” said Jingcheng Zhao, MD, of the clinical epidemiology division of Sweden’s Karolinska Institutet in Solna and lead author of the study.

Scientists say the field of medical research is on the cusp of a revolution as immense health databases guide discovery and improve clinical care. 

“If you can aggregate data, you have the statistical power to identify associations,” said David R. Crosslin, PhD, professor in the division of biomedical informatics and genomics at Tulane University in New Orleans. “It opens up the world for understanding diseases.”

With access to the large database, Dr. Zhao and his team found that some blood donors later experienced brain bleeds. And it turned out that the recipients of blood from those same donors carried the highest risk of experiencing a brain bleed later in life. Meanwhile, patients whose donors remained bleed-free had the lowest risk.
 

Not so fast in the United States

In Nordic countries, all hospitals, clinics, and pharmacies report data on diagnoses and health care visits to the government, tracking that began with paper and pen in the 1960s. But the United States health care system is too fragmented to replicate such efforts, with several brands of electronic medical records operating across different systems. Data sharing across institutions is minimal. 

Most comparable health data in the United States comes from reimbursement information collected by the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services on government-sponsored insurance programs.

“We would need all the health care systems in the country to operate within the same IT system or use the same data model,” said Euan Ashley, MD, PhD, professor of genomics at Stanford (Calif.) University. “It’s an exciting prospect. But I think [the United States] is one of the last countries where it’ll happen.”

States, meanwhile, collect health data on specific areas like sexually transmitted infection cases and rates. Other states have registries, like the Connecticut Tumor Registry, which was established in 1941 and is the oldest population-based cancer registry in the world.

But all of these efforts are ad hoc, and no equivalent exists for heart disease and other conditions.

Health data companies have recently entered the U.S. data industry mainly through partnerships with health systems and insurance companies, using deidentified information from patient charts.

The large databases have yielded important findings that randomized clinical trials simply cannot, according to Dr. Ashley.

For instance, a study found that a heavily-lauded immunotherapy treatment did not provide meaningful outcomes for patients aged 75 years or older, but it did for younger patients.

This sort of analysis might enable clinicians to administer treatments based on how effective they are for patients with particular demographics, according to Cary Gross, MD, professor at Yale University in New Haven, Conn.

“From a bedside standpoint, these large databases can identify who benefits from what,” Dr. Gross said. “Precision medicine is not just about genetic tailoring.” These large datasets also provide insight into genetic and environmental variables that contribute to disease. 

For instance, the UK Biobank has more than 500,000 participants paired with their medical records and scans of their body and brain. Researchers perform cognitive tests on participants and extract DNA from blood samples over their lifetime, allowing examination of interactions between risk factors. 

A similar but much smaller-scale effort underway in the United States, called the All of Us Research Program, has enrolled more than 650,000 people, less than one-third the size of the UK Biobank by relative populations. The goal of the program is to provide insights into prevention and treatment of chronic disease among a diverse set of at least one million participants. The database includes information on sexual orientation, which is a fairly new datapoint collected by researchers in an effort to study health outcomes and inequities among the LGBTQ+ community.

Dr. Crosslin and his colleagues are writing a grant proposal to use the All of Us database to identify genetic risks for preeclampsia. People with certain genetic profiles may be predisposed to the life-threatening condition, and researchers may discover that lifestyle changes could decrease risk, Dr. Crosslin said. 
 

Changes in the United States

The COVID-19 pandemic exposed the lack of centralized data in the United States because a majority of research on the virus has been conducted abroad in countries with national health care systems and these large databases. 

The U.S. gap spurred a group of researchers to create the National Institutes of Health–funded National COVID Cohort Collaborative (N3C), a project that gathers medical records from millions of patients across health systems and provides access to research teams investigating a wide spectrum of topics, such as optimal timing for ventilator use.

But until government or private health systems develop a way to share and regulate health data ethically and efficiently, significant limits will persist on what large-scale databases can do, Dr. Gross said. 

“At the federal level, we need to ensure this health information is made available for public health researchers so we don’t create these private fiefdoms of data,” Dr. Gross said. “Things have to be transparent. I think our country needs to take a step back and think about what we’re doing with our health data and how we can make sure it’s being managed ethically.”

A version of this article first appeared on Medscape.com.

Which conditions are caused by infection? Though it may seem like an amateur concern in the era of advanced microscopy, some culprits evade conventional methods of detection. Large medical databases hold the power to unlock answers. 

A recent study from Sweden and Denmark meticulously traced the lives and medical histories of nearly one million men and women in those countries who had received blood transfusions over nearly five decades. Some of these patients later experienced brain bleeds. The inescapable question: Could a virus found in some donor blood have caused the hemorrhages?

Traditionally, brain bleeds have been thought to strike at random. But the new study, published in JAMA, points toward an infection that causes or, at the very least, is linked to the condition. The researchers used a large databank to make the discovery. 

“As health data becomes more available and easier to analyze, we’ll see all kinds of cases like this,” said Jingcheng Zhao, MD, of the clinical epidemiology division of Sweden’s Karolinska Institutet in Solna and lead author of the study.

Scientists say the field of medical research is on the cusp of a revolution as immense health databases guide discovery and improve clinical care. 

“If you can aggregate data, you have the statistical power to identify associations,” said David R. Crosslin, PhD, professor in the division of biomedical informatics and genomics at Tulane University in New Orleans. “It opens up the world for understanding diseases.”

With access to the large database, Dr. Zhao and his team found that some blood donors later experienced brain bleeds. And it turned out that the recipients of blood from those same donors carried the highest risk of experiencing a brain bleed later in life. Meanwhile, patients whose donors remained bleed-free had the lowest risk.
 

Not so fast in the United States

In Nordic countries, all hospitals, clinics, and pharmacies report data on diagnoses and health care visits to the government, tracking that began with paper and pen in the 1960s. But the United States health care system is too fragmented to replicate such efforts, with several brands of electronic medical records operating across different systems. Data sharing across institutions is minimal. 

Most comparable health data in the United States comes from reimbursement information collected by the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services on government-sponsored insurance programs.

“We would need all the health care systems in the country to operate within the same IT system or use the same data model,” said Euan Ashley, MD, PhD, professor of genomics at Stanford (Calif.) University. “It’s an exciting prospect. But I think [the United States] is one of the last countries where it’ll happen.”

States, meanwhile, collect health data on specific areas like sexually transmitted infection cases and rates. Other states have registries, like the Connecticut Tumor Registry, which was established in 1941 and is the oldest population-based cancer registry in the world.

But all of these efforts are ad hoc, and no equivalent exists for heart disease and other conditions.

Health data companies have recently entered the U.S. data industry mainly through partnerships with health systems and insurance companies, using deidentified information from patient charts.

The large databases have yielded important findings that randomized clinical trials simply cannot, according to Dr. Ashley.

For instance, a study found that a heavily-lauded immunotherapy treatment did not provide meaningful outcomes for patients aged 75 years or older, but it did for younger patients.

This sort of analysis might enable clinicians to administer treatments based on how effective they are for patients with particular demographics, according to Cary Gross, MD, professor at Yale University in New Haven, Conn.

“From a bedside standpoint, these large databases can identify who benefits from what,” Dr. Gross said. “Precision medicine is not just about genetic tailoring.” These large datasets also provide insight into genetic and environmental variables that contribute to disease. 

For instance, the UK Biobank has more than 500,000 participants paired with their medical records and scans of their body and brain. Researchers perform cognitive tests on participants and extract DNA from blood samples over their lifetime, allowing examination of interactions between risk factors. 

A similar but much smaller-scale effort underway in the United States, called the All of Us Research Program, has enrolled more than 650,000 people, less than one-third the size of the UK Biobank by relative populations. The goal of the program is to provide insights into prevention and treatment of chronic disease among a diverse set of at least one million participants. The database includes information on sexual orientation, which is a fairly new datapoint collected by researchers in an effort to study health outcomes and inequities among the LGBTQ+ community.

Dr. Crosslin and his colleagues are writing a grant proposal to use the All of Us database to identify genetic risks for preeclampsia. People with certain genetic profiles may be predisposed to the life-threatening condition, and researchers may discover that lifestyle changes could decrease risk, Dr. Crosslin said. 
 

Changes in the United States

The COVID-19 pandemic exposed the lack of centralized data in the United States because a majority of research on the virus has been conducted abroad in countries with national health care systems and these large databases. 

The U.S. gap spurred a group of researchers to create the National Institutes of Health–funded National COVID Cohort Collaborative (N3C), a project that gathers medical records from millions of patients across health systems and provides access to research teams investigating a wide spectrum of topics, such as optimal timing for ventilator use.

But until government or private health systems develop a way to share and regulate health data ethically and efficiently, significant limits will persist on what large-scale databases can do, Dr. Gross said. 

“At the federal level, we need to ensure this health information is made available for public health researchers so we don’t create these private fiefdoms of data,” Dr. Gross said. “Things have to be transparent. I think our country needs to take a step back and think about what we’re doing with our health data and how we can make sure it’s being managed ethically.”

A version of this article first appeared on Medscape.com.

The XXXIII Olympic Summer Games will take place in Paris, France, from July 26 to August 11, 2024, and a variety of outdoor sporting events (eg, surfing, cycling, beach volleyball) will be included. Participation in the Olympic Games is a distinct honor for athletes selected to compete at the highest level in their sports.

Because of their training regimens and lifestyles, Olympic athletes face unique health risks. One such risk appears to be skin cancer, a substantial contributor to the global burden of disease. Taken together, basal cell carcinoma, squamous cell carcinoma, and melanoma account for 6.7 million cases of skin cancer worldwide. Squamous cell carcinoma and malignant skin melanoma were attributed to 1.2 million and 1.7 million life-years lost to disability, respectively.¹

Olympic athletes are at increased risk for sunburn from UVA and UVB radiation, placing them at higher risk for both melanoma and nonmelanoma skin cancers.^2,3 Sweating increases skin photosensitivity, sportswear often offers inadequate sun protection, and sustained high-intensity exercise itself has an immunosuppressive effect. Athletes competing in skiing and snowboarding events also receive radiation reflected off snow and ice at high altitudes.³ In fact, skiing without sunscreen at 11,000-feet above sea level can induce sunburn after only 6 minutes of exposure.⁴ Moreover, sweat, water immersion, and friction can decrease the effectiveness of topical sunscreens.⁵

World-class athletes appear to be exposed to UV radiation to a substantially higher degree than the general public. In an analysis of 144 events at the 2020 XXXII Olympic Summer Games in Tokyo, Japan, the highest exposure assessments were for women’s tennis, men’s golf, and men’s road cycling.⁶ In a 2020 study (N=240), the rates of sunburn were as high as 76.7% among Olympic sailors, elite surfers, and windsurfers, with more than one-quarter of athletes reporting sunburn that lasted longer than 24 hours.⁷ An earlier study reported that professional cyclists were exposed to UV radiation during a single race that exceeded the personal exposure limit by 30 times.⁸

Regrettably, the high level of sun exposure experienced by elite athletes is compounded by their low rate of sunscreen use. In a 2020 survey of 95 Olympians and super sprint triathletes, approximately half rarely used sunscreen, with 1 in 5 athletes never using sunscreen during training.⁹ In another study of 246 elite athletes in surfing, windsurfing, and sailing, nearly half used inadequate sun protection and nearly one-quarter reported never using sunscreen.¹⁰ Surprisingly, as many as 90% of Olympic athletes and super sprint competitors understood the importance of using sunscreen.⁹

What can we learn from these findings?

First, elite athletes remain at high risk for skin cancer because of training regimens, occupational environmental hazards, and other requirements of their sport. Second, despite awareness of the risks of UV radiation exposure, Olympic athletes utilize inadequate photoprotection. Athletes with darker skin are still at risk for skin cancer, photoaging, and pigmentation disorders—indicating a need for photoprotective behaviors in athletes of all skin types.¹¹

Therefore, efforts to promote adequate sunscreen use and understanding of the consequences of UV radiation may need to be prioritized earlier in athletes’ careers and implemented according to evidence-based guidelines. For example, the Stanford University Network for Sun Protection, Outreach, Research and Teamwork (Sunsport) provided information about skin cancer risk and prevention by educating student-athletes, coaches, and trainers in the National Collegiate Athletic Association in the United States. The Sunsport initiative led to a dramatic increase in sunscreen use by student-athletes as well as increased knowledge and discussion of skin cancer risk.¹²

The XXXIII Olympic Summer Games will take place in Paris, France, from July 26 to August 11, 2024, and a variety of outdoor sporting events (eg, surfing, cycling, beach volleyball) will be included. Participation in the Olympic Games is a distinct honor for athletes selected to compete at the highest level in their sports.

Because of their training regimens and lifestyles, Olympic athletes face unique health risks. One such risk appears to be skin cancer, a substantial contributor to the global burden of disease. Taken together, basal cell carcinoma, squamous cell carcinoma, and melanoma account for 6.7 million cases of skin cancer worldwide. Squamous cell carcinoma and malignant skin melanoma were attributed to 1.2 million and 1.7 million life-years lost to disability, respectively.¹

Olympic athletes are at increased risk for sunburn from UVA and UVB radiation, placing them at higher risk for both melanoma and nonmelanoma skin cancers.^2,3 Sweating increases skin photosensitivity, sportswear often offers inadequate sun protection, and sustained high-intensity exercise itself has an immunosuppressive effect. Athletes competing in skiing and snowboarding events also receive radiation reflected off snow and ice at high altitudes.³ In fact, skiing without sunscreen at 11,000-feet above sea level can induce sunburn after only 6 minutes of exposure.⁴ Moreover, sweat, water immersion, and friction can decrease the effectiveness of topical sunscreens.⁵

World-class athletes appear to be exposed to UV radiation to a substantially higher degree than the general public. In an analysis of 144 events at the 2020 XXXII Olympic Summer Games in Tokyo, Japan, the highest exposure assessments were for women’s tennis, men’s golf, and men’s road cycling.⁶ In a 2020 study (N=240), the rates of sunburn were as high as 76.7% among Olympic sailors, elite surfers, and windsurfers, with more than one-quarter of athletes reporting sunburn that lasted longer than 24 hours.⁷ An earlier study reported that professional cyclists were exposed to UV radiation during a single race that exceeded the personal exposure limit by 30 times.⁸

Regrettably, the high level of sun exposure experienced by elite athletes is compounded by their low rate of sunscreen use. In a 2020 survey of 95 Olympians and super sprint triathletes, approximately half rarely used sunscreen, with 1 in 5 athletes never using sunscreen during training.⁹ In another study of 246 elite athletes in surfing, windsurfing, and sailing, nearly half used inadequate sun protection and nearly one-quarter reported never using sunscreen.¹⁰ Surprisingly, as many as 90% of Olympic athletes and super sprint competitors understood the importance of using sunscreen.⁹

What can we learn from these findings?

First, elite athletes remain at high risk for skin cancer because of training regimens, occupational environmental hazards, and other requirements of their sport. Second, despite awareness of the risks of UV radiation exposure, Olympic athletes utilize inadequate photoprotection. Athletes with darker skin are still at risk for skin cancer, photoaging, and pigmentation disorders—indicating a need for photoprotective behaviors in athletes of all skin types.¹¹

Therefore, efforts to promote adequate sunscreen use and understanding of the consequences of UV radiation may need to be prioritized earlier in athletes’ careers and implemented according to evidence-based guidelines. For example, the Stanford University Network for Sun Protection, Outreach, Research and Teamwork (Sunsport) provided information about skin cancer risk and prevention by educating student-athletes, coaches, and trainers in the National Collegiate Athletic Association in the United States. The Sunsport initiative led to a dramatic increase in sunscreen use by student-athletes as well as increased knowledge and discussion of skin cancer risk.¹²

The XXXIII Olympic Summer Games will take place in Paris, France, from July 26 to August 11, 2024, and a variety of outdoor sporting events (eg, surfing, cycling, beach volleyball) will be included. Participation in the Olympic Games is a distinct honor for athletes selected to compete at the highest level in their sports.

Because of their training regimens and lifestyles, Olympic athletes face unique health risks. One such risk appears to be skin cancer, a substantial contributor to the global burden of disease. Taken together, basal cell carcinoma, squamous cell carcinoma, and melanoma account for 6.7 million cases of skin cancer worldwide. Squamous cell carcinoma and malignant skin melanoma were attributed to 1.2 million and 1.7 million life-years lost to disability, respectively.¹

Olympic athletes are at increased risk for sunburn from UVA and UVB radiation, placing them at higher risk for both melanoma and nonmelanoma skin cancers.^2,3 Sweating increases skin photosensitivity, sportswear often offers inadequate sun protection, and sustained high-intensity exercise itself has an immunosuppressive effect. Athletes competing in skiing and snowboarding events also receive radiation reflected off snow and ice at high altitudes.³ In fact, skiing without sunscreen at 11,000-feet above sea level can induce sunburn after only 6 minutes of exposure.⁴ Moreover, sweat, water immersion, and friction can decrease the effectiveness of topical sunscreens.⁵

World-class athletes appear to be exposed to UV radiation to a substantially higher degree than the general public. In an analysis of 144 events at the 2020 XXXII Olympic Summer Games in Tokyo, Japan, the highest exposure assessments were for women’s tennis, men’s golf, and men’s road cycling.⁶ In a 2020 study (N=240), the rates of sunburn were as high as 76.7% among Olympic sailors, elite surfers, and windsurfers, with more than one-quarter of athletes reporting sunburn that lasted longer than 24 hours.⁷ An earlier study reported that professional cyclists were exposed to UV radiation during a single race that exceeded the personal exposure limit by 30 times.⁸

Regrettably, the high level of sun exposure experienced by elite athletes is compounded by their low rate of sunscreen use. In a 2020 survey of 95 Olympians and super sprint triathletes, approximately half rarely used sunscreen, with 1 in 5 athletes never using sunscreen during training.⁹ In another study of 246 elite athletes in surfing, windsurfing, and sailing, nearly half used inadequate sun protection and nearly one-quarter reported never using sunscreen.¹⁰ Surprisingly, as many as 90% of Olympic athletes and super sprint competitors understood the importance of using sunscreen.⁹

What can we learn from these findings?

First, elite athletes remain at high risk for skin cancer because of training regimens, occupational environmental hazards, and other requirements of their sport. Second, despite awareness of the risks of UV radiation exposure, Olympic athletes utilize inadequate photoprotection. Athletes with darker skin are still at risk for skin cancer, photoaging, and pigmentation disorders—indicating a need for photoprotective behaviors in athletes of all skin types.¹¹

Therefore, efforts to promote adequate sunscreen use and understanding of the consequences of UV radiation may need to be prioritized earlier in athletes’ careers and implemented according to evidence-based guidelines. For example, the Stanford University Network for Sun Protection, Outreach, Research and Teamwork (Sunsport) provided information about skin cancer risk and prevention by educating student-athletes, coaches, and trainers in the National Collegiate Athletic Association in the United States. The Sunsport initiative led to a dramatic increase in sunscreen use by student-athletes as well as increased knowledge and discussion of skin cancer risk.¹²