Serving cancer patients better

The Daily Star Roundtable titled, "Challenges of cancer treatment in Bangladesh: Ensuring better diagnosis and service to patients"

Diagnosis of cancer and delivering better services to patients can be ensured in the country, if doctors, radiotherapists and technicians work as a team. An attitudinal change of doctors towards patients can also go a long way in providing quality treatment. In this manner, local cancer patients can be de-motivated from travelling abroad in the hope of better treatment. .
The above were the observations of doctors specialising in cancer, radiation therapists, biomedical engineers, biochemists, biotechnologists and journalists present at a roundtable hosted by the Daily Star at its Conference centre.
The roundtable, chaired by Professor ABMF Karim, professor Emeritus of Radiation Oncology at Velje University of Amsterdam and others present identified infrastructural limitations at the hospitals providing treatment of cancer as a bottleneck in providing service in Bangladesh. There are few modern machines for diagnosing incidence of the medical condition in patients.
In absence of a reliable census, the exact number of people suffering from cancer in Bangladesh could not be ascertained. However, the number may increase by 50 per cent in the next four decades, the roundtable was told. Though the rate of incidence of the disease is increasing in the developing and underdeveloped countries like Bangladesh, the scenario is quite the opposite in the dev eloped countries. That is because, with the advancement of medical science, people in the advanced nations are benefiting from preventive and early detection methods developed there.
The awareness level of the population about this mortal disease is also low in Bangladesh, so launching massive campaigns to enhance the public's awareness about cancer can help stop the aggravation of the conditions cancer in a patient. It will also motivate people to adopt early measures to detect the condition or better take preventive steps like inoculation.
Scientists present at the discussion stressed the need to use 'biomarkers' to track down the presence of cancerous cells in the body through the use of molecular biology.
Environment pollution was acknowledged as the biggest cause of cancer. Tobacco smoking being another cause of cancer, the speakers stressed the importance of launching a movement against tobacco smoking as a preventive measure.