The Center for Surgical Science receives funding from the government to conduct research on optimizing the selection of patients with cancer to operate during the novel coronavirus pandemic in order to reduce risk of infection with the virus, length of stay, morbidity and ICU admission.

Under this extraordinary situation of the Covid-19 pandemia, patients who undergo cancer surgery, which may result in postoperative complications, have an increased risk of being more severely affected by the virus. Avoiding complications, preventing ICU admittance, and discharging these patients as soon as possible is of great importance for the individual patient and the health care resource utilization. On the other hand, there is ample evidence supporting that selected postponement of surgery, where the time can be actively utilized for optimizing the patient’s general condition (prehabilitation) will reduce hospital stay, risk of complications and even readmissions. The core concept of prehabilitation across cancers is of low complexity and includes anemia correction, dietary intervention, and physiotherapy.

In this project, we aim to integrate data from national cancer registries, as well as the Danish Intensive Care Database, into a common data model that can interpret deep phenotypic properties and relations in order to guide clinicians when selecting patients for prehabilitation and other individualized personalized perioperative interventions. The project results will be directly comparable for external validation with numerous similar studies currently executed worldwide and the produced prediction models will be immediately utilized by a vast international network.

See all the full list of funded projects at the Ministry of Research and Education website.