June 09, 2008	Monday	Jamadi-us-Sani 04, 1429

KARACHI, June 8: Speakers at a seminar on Sunday stressed that there is a dire need for developing a ‘tumour registry’ in the country to ensure early detection of malignancies and protect lives.

Dr Altaf Hashmi, in his presentation on ‘Uro-Oncology: the disease burden,’ at the inaugural symposium and hands-on workshop on brachytherapy, organised by the Sindh Institute of Urology and Transplantation (SIUT), called for proper record keeping at all health-care facilities.

Reiterating the fact that early diagnosis made the treatment of cancers easier, he said the absence of a baseline had largely made a large majority of cancer cases go unnoticed with little possibility of treatment.

The estimated figures and available hospital-based data, with their respective limitations, were said to identify only six per cent prevalence of prostate cancer and 10 to 15 per cent cervical cancer.

He called for dedicated clinics for specific diseases with the provision of latest medical technology. With specific reference to prostate and cervical cancers, he said brachytherapy and devencirobotic laproscopic proctectomy were the interventions that have advantages in reducing the suffering of patients.

SIUT director Prof Adibul Hasan Rizvi said 80 to 85 per cent of the people in Pakistan were disenfranchised from the benefits of medical sciences due to lack of funds.

Branchotherapy, a sub-class of chemotherapy, he said, was established to improve the survival rates of patients, besides protecting them and the administrators of the therapy against varied risks.

The facility, first in a public sector hospital in the country, has been initiated with the support of the Dr Sara Jaffery Foundation, through procurement of a branchotherapy machine worth Rs35 million. Dr Sara Jaffery, a Dow graduate, expired due to breast cancer.

Dr Rizvi, later talking to the media, said all men above 45 needed to get regular medical check-ups for detection of prostate cancer, the commonest type of cancer registered in men.—APP