Dr. Shawna Willey: Prioritizing Care for Breast Cancer Patients During COVID-19

Shawna C. Willey, MD

The COVID-19 pandemic presents clinicians with a unique set of challenges in managing breast cancer patients. As hospital resources and staff become more limited during the COVID-19 pandemic, it becomes critically important to define which breast cancer patients require more urgent care and which patients can wait for treatment until the pandemic is over.

A group of medical experts (including Inova’s Dr. Shawna Willey) recently penned a set of recommendations for the journal Breast Cancer Research and Treatment about prioritization, treatment, and triage of breast cancer patients during the COVID-19 pandemic.

The article suggests a method of categorizing breast cancer patients into priority levels for urgency of care across all specialties, and it provides treatment recommendations for each patient scenario to help maximize both safety and treatment effectiveness.

Read the article here

About Dr. Shawna Willey

Shawna Willey, MD, joined Inova’s renowned Breast Cancer Program with more than 30 years of experience, and serves as Peterson Chair of Breast Cancer Research, a position endowed by the Peterson Family Foundation. In her role, she leads research endeavors and provides recommendations for new technologies and treatments in breast cancer.

Leave a Comment