From Fred Ezeh, Abuja
Oncologists in Nigeria have commenced moves to adopt harmonized and standard guideline for diagnosis and treatment of cancer in Nigeria.
Head, Radiotherapy and Oncology Department, National Hospital, Abuja, Dr. Uchechukwu Shagaya, who spoke to journalists at a one-day summit on the uptake of the National Comprehensive Cancer Network (NCCN) harmonized guideline for sub-sahara Africa, said the guideline was basically for Specialists and other related caregivers as it provide guides on prevention of cancer all the way to palliation.
She said: “Prior to now, Nigeria has no standardised cancer screening programmes. Patients present late for diagnosis because the diagnosis result mostly come sketchy. I mean if you are in the village and patronizes primary health care centre that doesn’t have high index of suspicion, and they are tossing you back and forth, that becomes a leak in the part of the continuum.
“Then comes to actual treatment which is expensive. And then you go on to access services like radiotherapy which is limited in number for 200 million Nigerians. We don’t have enough machines. Then with the brain drain that’s going on right now, we do not even have enough Specialists to attend to the needs of the people. You have one Pathologist looking at 5, 000 slides. So, there is still a lot and, that’s why we are saying we want to bridge that gap.”
Director of Clinical Services, National Hospital Abuja (NHA), Dr. Badejo Olawale, expressed optimism that the guideline will help significantly in standardizing cancer detection and treatment in Nigeria.
He said: “What we have is a situation where people do things from their own perspective. Before now, some people start from the head, some from the neck and some from the foot, hence there’s lot of confusion. The guideline would help us greatly to practice within a set goal such that if all you have in your centre are surgeons and no radiologist, your surgical practice will fall in line and the patient, if he or she ever has reasons to go to a place where there are facilities, you would not have done harm to that patient.
“So it’s beneficial to the practitioner in terms of guides, beneficial to the patient in terms of safety and getting the best possible care in the care spectrum across the different disease types. We have guidelines for all the cancers and there are even guidelines to help patients seeking information, helping them to take instructions and know what questions to ask in the course of the management of that disease. It also help families to be able to prepare the next best thing in the management of the disease and at the end of it all, it brings out the best outcome irrespective of the level of resources available in that region.”
Meanwhile, Prof. King-David Yawe, Convener, University of Abuja Teaching Hospital Tumour Board, appreciated the organisers of the summit which, he said, was designed to acquaint the healthcare givers with innovations contained in the comprehensive cancer guidelines.
He said: “This programme will equip all of us who are managing breasts and other cancers in one way or the other to be able to know where we can drum up support anytime we need. And that is very important.
“So you will find that you don’t have to keep a patient waiting in your place for a long time. You can quickly transfer that patient or refer the patient to where that service is immediately available. That way you will be able to treat the patients on time and therefore be able to prolong their lives.
“Another dimension of this is in the area of screening and ensuring early diagnosis, and then to treatment. There are fewer centres with mammography facilities and MRI, they can help cancers when they are very small.”