Health officials are now facing another possible health crisis that may affect the United States. Ever since lockdowns and the coronavirus pandemic happened, a much lower rate of cancer diagnoses was conducted from February until March. Due to this, hospitals fear that undetected cancer patients might increase in no time.
Meanwhile, Nvidia releases a new technology to conduct artificial intelligence (AI) in automatically sensing body heat from people coming in and out of hospitals.
COVID-19 affects another disease that kills patients too
Coronavirus did a lot of repercussions in the economy, health, technology, and other industries. But one thing that the pandemic hugely affected was the number of people visiting hospitals. Since COVID-19 is a viral disease, most people decide to stay in their homes and fear the presence of entering a clinical facility.
Cancer patients, for one, get the same thinking. The report says that new skin cancer diagnoses plunged into an 80% lower rate compared to before. This means that a massive number of cancer patients or the ones who have symptoms won't bear to visit hospitals and check-ups anymore due to the pandemic's risk.
The US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (US CDC) announced before that all "elective" in-person visits will be delayed to curb the spread of Coronavirus. Hospitals are prohibited from providing routine check-ups, and cancer screenings said in April.
But this might change soon.
"A consequence of the pandemic has been the under-utilization of important medical services for patients with non-COVID-19-related urgent and emergent health needs," the CDC said. "As the pandemic continues, healthcare systems must balance the need to provide necessary services while minimizing risk to patients and healthcare personnel."
Cancer patients are encouraged to visit hospitals
The American Cancer Society is now encouraging patients to take cancer screenings if they think that the hospitals near them are already safe from the pandemic.
The agency also notifies that cancer researches are now halted amid pandemic.
"It is abundantly clear that the COVID-19 pandemic is having a major impact on cancer research," Dr. William C. Phelps, the society's senior vice president of extramural research, said at the time.
For now, it is still unclear the exact rate of cancer patients within the months of the viral disease.
Nvidia's AI system that senses the spread of the virus in hospitals
To provide additional health protection for all patients visiting hospitals, American technology company Nvidia launches Clara Guardian, a smart hospital AI system to track the spread of infectious disease in a hospital.
This technology can be used to check people with high temperature, social-distancing surveillance, and more.
Clara Guardian and partners like AnyVision and Care.ai are currently deployed in 50 hospitals in countries like China, France, Italy, and Israel, covering 10,000 hospital rooms today.
