The alarming rise of cancer cases in Hyderabad is upsetting and the new survey tells that nearly 20,000 cancer cases each month are declared untreated by the doctors in the city after patients reaching the last stage of the disease. The cancer hospitals in the city are merely crowded with patients waiting to get treated.
It is also revealed that 2000 cases of HIV and Tuberculosis have been reported each month in Hyderabad. Not only cancer cases, but deadly diseases like HIV and TB patients are also reaching the last stages, with being untreatable. Moreover, the city has only two palliative care centres and one hospice, together with having the capacity of 100- 120 beds.
Dr Jayalatha, Director MNJ Institute of Cancer, talks on the requirement of palliative care. She said that “the pain killers and sedative drugs like morphine are licensed only for use in palliative care centres, hints at the level of pain these patients experience. Since the disease cannot be treated anymore, in palliative care, only symptoms are managed like fluid fills in the abdomen, a nerve burst and pain”.
It is unfortunate to learn that the required attention is not being given for setting up palliative care centres as it’s not profitable like hospitals. “There is no doubt that palliative care services need to be ramped up to cater to the demands of increasing incidence of NCDs. Corporate hospitals have not got into this as palliative care is not a highly profitable business,” said Mujtaba Hussain Aksari, founder Helping Hand Foundation, which runs one of the two palliative care centres in the city.
One of the senior doctors from cancer hospitals said that the prolonged waiting period is often taking a toll on cancer patients families who are striving hard to save their family members after selling properties and spending huge amounts. Without the proper palliative care centres, the families are going through a financial and emotional crisis, with constant hardships seeing their loved ones in painful procedures.
Palliative care is extremely essential as for chemotherapy patients should be given assistance in pain management and symptom management with appropriate psychosocial support. The huge numbers of untreatable patients in Hyderabad is indeed a scary situation and without the Palliative care, one would not be offered its goal is to improve the quality of a person’s life.
