KARACHI, June 25: Medical experts on Friday observed that vaginal cancer is most common among older women, and it was important to diagnose it at an early stage as management of the disease was associated with good prognosis.

They made these observations at a meeting of the Gynaecological Oncology Group (GOG), held at the PMA House, which discussed the causes of vaginal cancer and possibilities of its treatment in the country.

Dr Farah of the Sindh Government Hospital, Orangi Town, said that it was very important for all family physicians to help in diagnosing the vaginal cancer at an early stages of the disease, as patients usually came to doctors with abnormal bleeding, small or big growth with complaints of foul-smelling discharge. He advised all women above 60 years to contact their doctors if they felt some abnormality.

Prof Serajuddaula Syed of the Sindh Medical College said that vaginal cancer was a very rare cancer. He advised all the gynaecologists involved in cancer surgery, that they must make sure that whenever they send a tissue for biopsy, it should help diagnose the disease and if the tissue was not enough, it should be properly marked. "The best thing about vaginal cancer is that it is treatable without causing a lot of discomfort to patient," he added.

Dr Shagufta of the Liaquat National Hospital said that surgery was the primary treatment for vaginal cancer and early vaginal cancer or pre-malignant lesions could be treated with very simple methods.

"Doctors are in the habit of hiding the information from patients, which is not a good practice," she said, and stressed that all doctors, especially gynaecologists, should inform their patients regarding the disease, its complications and prognosis.

Dr Jawaid Malik of the LNH said that in case of advance vaginal cancer, the radiotherapy was the treatment of choice as radiation gave very good result in localized lesion. "Chemotherapy has a limited role and sometimes a combination of chemotherapy and radiotherapy is required," he added.

He emphasized on team work in the management of vaginal cancer. The meeting was followed by a discussion.-PPI