Since the outbreak of COVID-19 pandemic, a large number of elective or limited operations, including tumor treatment, have been postponed. With the deepening of the understanding of the virus and the change of the prevention policy, the impact of the pandemic is gradually shrinking, and a large number of operations delayed by the pandemic will be rescheduled. However, there is no consensus on the best time to perform surgery for patients infected with SARS-CoV-2, and the consensus on thoracic surgery is more limited. This article reviews the research progress in the timing of surgical operations, especially thoracic surgery, after SARS-CoV-2 infection.
This study reports a case of a 56-year-old female patient with BRAF-mutated non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) who successfully underwent curative surgery after neoadjuvant targeted therapy with the BRAF inhibitor dabrafenib combined with the MEK inhibitor trametinib. The chest drainage tube was removed 2 days postoperatively, and the patient was discharged smoothly. Postoperative pathology indicated invasive adenocarcinoma, moderately to highly differentiated, with 80% being lepidic type, and the maximum tumor diameter was 4 cm. No vascular invasion, nerve invasion, air cavity dissemination, pleural invasion, or lymph node metastasis were observed. The postoperative staging was ypT2aN0M0. The patient continued with adjuvant treatment with dabrafenib combined with trametinib postoperatively, and no signs of recurrence were found in the follow-up examination six months after surgery.