Govt see what BSP is doing
THREE branches of the Bank South Pacific in Lae Tuesday pitched in to help out the Angau Memorial Hospital.
The branches are geting behind a project in the hospital to give a facelift to the Radio Therapy and Oncology Clinic at Angau. The bank’s help comes in the form of a new chemotherapy room to store vital chemotherapy drugs. and other materials and equipment. This is a commendable effort from the bank and we take our hats off to them for this significant community effort.
Angau runs the country’s only cancer treatment clinic. It’s the only place where Papua New Guineans suffering from cancer can seek treatment.
Unfortunately, the clinic is run down and for years has been non operational because of issues as basic as lack of specialists, broken down machinery and lack of drugs.
So it is with great relief, it is to see a major corporate citizen get behind a project such as upgrading the chemotherapy room. Any imporvement to what we now have in the hospital will be a morale booster for the staff of the clinic who are plagued by all sorts of problems. We need more such corporate citizens to step forward and contribute to building up the oncology clinic which hundreds of of lives literally depend on.
Every little anyone does to help the clinic, will add to so far, futile efforts to rebuild this clinic. This however, needs to be taken a little further ... push the refresh button on efforts to purchase a new cobalt machine. The cobalt machine is used in the actual treatment of cancer patients. Unfortunately the one we have at Lae is an old one and was part of the cobalt machines that were used in 1960s and 1970s. As a result, it is difficult to find people specialised in this machine in the country, and indeed, the world.
What we now have in the hospital is outdated and is inoperable most of the time. Only one expariate specialist doctor can work this machine. We have been fortunate in getting Dr John Niblett who had worked at the cancer unit in the past year, to return to the country and run the clinic.
He is the only doctor that can operate the cobalt machine at Angau and when he is not there, as was the case a couple of years ago, the whole clinic literally shuts down and cancer patients.
The Health Department says it is on a search to find alternatives to improve cancer treatment in the country, despite having scarce manpower in this specialty. We must train radio oncologists, but these people would be like any other specialist doctors, would have to be trained and work for years before they are qualified as oncologists. But it has to be done and we have make a start soon.
Cancer is PNG’s fourth most common disease yet approximately three-quarters of sufferers face negative outcomes due to late diagnosis and inadequate treatment.
Our efforts to rebuild the clinic should be now to replace the cobalt machine and train up Papua New Guinean specialists to run the clinic. The Government, which, must, and should take full responsibility for this, needs to take a long hard look at this need of the public health system and put some some serious money into improving it.
The branches are geting behind a project in the hospital to give a facelift to the Radio Therapy and Oncology Clinic at Angau. The bank’s help comes in the form of a new chemotherapy room to store vital chemotherapy drugs. and other materials and equipment. This is a commendable effort from the bank and we take our hats off to them for this significant community effort.
Angau runs the country’s only cancer treatment clinic. It’s the only place where Papua New Guineans suffering from cancer can seek treatment.
Unfortunately, the clinic is run down and for years has been non operational because of issues as basic as lack of specialists, broken down machinery and lack of drugs.
So it is with great relief, it is to see a major corporate citizen get behind a project such as upgrading the chemotherapy room. Any imporvement to what we now have in the hospital will be a morale booster for the staff of the clinic who are plagued by all sorts of problems. We need more such corporate citizens to step forward and contribute to building up the oncology clinic which hundreds of of lives literally depend on.
Every little anyone does to help the clinic, will add to so far, futile efforts to rebuild this clinic. This however, needs to be taken a little further ... push the refresh button on efforts to purchase a new cobalt machine. The cobalt machine is used in the actual treatment of cancer patients. Unfortunately the one we have at Lae is an old one and was part of the cobalt machines that were used in 1960s and 1970s. As a result, it is difficult to find people specialised in this machine in the country, and indeed, the world.
What we now have in the hospital is outdated and is inoperable most of the time. Only one expariate specialist doctor can work this machine. We have been fortunate in getting Dr John Niblett who had worked at the cancer unit in the past year, to return to the country and run the clinic.
He is the only doctor that can operate the cobalt machine at Angau and when he is not there, as was the case a couple of years ago, the whole clinic literally shuts down and cancer patients.
The Health Department says it is on a search to find alternatives to improve cancer treatment in the country, despite having scarce manpower in this specialty. We must train radio oncologists, but these people would be like any other specialist doctors, would have to be trained and work for years before they are qualified as oncologists. But it has to be done and we have make a start soon.
Cancer is PNG’s fourth most common disease yet approximately three-quarters of sufferers face negative outcomes due to late diagnosis and inadequate treatment.
Our efforts to rebuild the clinic should be now to replace the cobalt machine and train up Papua New Guinean specialists to run the clinic. The Government, which, must, and should take full responsibility for this, needs to take a long hard look at this need of the public health system and put some some serious money into improving it.
No comments:
Post a Comment