Cancer patients wait in vain for chemo

THE EDITOR: The doctors, nurses and the other workers who make up the staff at the St James Cancer Centre are certainly among the best healthcare givers in the country. They are extremely polite, helpful, and they take care of each cancer patient as though they are dealing with a member of their own family. I, therefore, wish to express my gratitude to all the members of the staff and also to ask Almighty God to bestow his blessings upon them and their families.

However, about three to four months now, many patients are not receiving chemotherapy on a timely basis. This is because the machine that mixes the chemotherapy drugs has been down and as a result, some patients are not receiving treatment. Some patients have not received chemotherapy for consecutive periods of two or three sessions. Each session of chemotherapy is very important to treat with whatever cancer patients are battling with.

Many patients leave their homes and get to the centre very early in the morning in the hope of receiving treatment and after waiting for many hours are being told, they will not be able to receive any chemotherapy. A new date is given to return for possible treatment. Sometimes when you return on that new date, you are again told the same thing. Once more you have to return to your home without being treated.

Patients have been informed that the Port of Spain General Hospital is assisting the institution by mixing and supplying a very small amount of chemotherapy drugs. For that reason, only a few patients can receive chemotherapy treatment. Most of the time the chemotherapy drugs arrive from the hospital in the afternoon, and by that time, the patients selected to receive treatment are now very hungry, tired, exhausted and frustrated. They are administered their prescribed chemotherapy drugs very late in the afternoon.

It is not only the patients who are frustrated. The doctors are also frustrated. One can see the painful expressions on the doctors' faces when they have to watch a cancer patient who is in pain, and tell such person, "sorry, you will not be able to receive chemotherapy today, as only a small amount will be coming from the Port of Spain General Hospital."

It has been said that several attempts were made to repair the machine that mixes the drugs at St James Cancer Centre. To date it is still not repaired. The problem apparently is a huge one. I am sincerely pleading with the very hard-working Minister of Health, Mr Deyalsingh, to render some very urgent assistance to the cancer patients so that the machine to mix the chemotherapy drugs can be in operation soon.

LINDSAY WHEELER

Mausica