Fatal Diagnosis: Cancer Treatment in Bangladesh
It was indeed a pleasure to read this article. As a former oncologist, trained in the US, I am appalled at the lack of training and protocols in Bangladesh. Apollo Hospital is the only one that has a SOP (standard operating protocol) and I know this because I, together with Dr Ferdous Shariar, initiated the same in United Hospital, albeit without success.
Dr Arif Matin
Thanks for your brilliant reporting on cancer treatment in Bangladesh. You should carry it on and do a series. In this feature, you have focused on overall malignancies in cancer treatment in Bangladesh. I'd request you to write about childhood malignancies as most are curable if detected at an earlier stage in comparison to adult counterparts such as ALL [acute lymphocytic leukemia] and NHL [non-Hodgkin's lymphoma]. Treatment for children's cancer is available in Bangladesh so awareness about this should be created. Am waiting for future stories both in English and Bangla newspapers.
Dr Nazneen Sultana
Thanks for presenting the real picture of Bangladesh. Many curable diseases became incurable here due to such a predicament. Moreover, we physicians are poor in communicating with patients and their relatives, whom we call "patient party". While we are trying to enrich palliative care to reduce suffering, it remains sadly true that almost 90 percent of cancer patients in NICRH [National Institute of Cancer Research and Hospital] need palliative care but the institute does not focus on that. We had a national situation analysis done in 2016 with the help of NIPORT [National Institute of Population Research and Training]. Unfortunately, the results were never published.
Dr Rubayat
Centre for Palliative Care, BSMMU
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