| “Cancer treatment is very expensive,” said Oncologist, Dr. Carl Niamatali,Bvb Trikot, as he stressed the importance of early detection as a means of helping to reduce the financial impact of the disease on the health care system.Oncologists, Dr. Carl NiamataliAnd treating breast cancer correctly should be one of the main focus of the health sector in the fight against cancer, Dr Niamatali said.He pointed out that in addition to embracing measures to prevent the disease, keen focus must also be given to early detection. He, moreover, underscored the need for persons to pay attention to their bodies.“For example when it comes to breast cancer, women need to know what their breasts look and feel like. They need to understand that if there are any changes out of the normal they need to check with their health worker or doctor…If you check with one doctor and you are not satisfied, then go check with another,” said Dr. Niamatali.He asserted that the shape and size of the breasts could help to determine if something is wrong. “You need to check to see if there is any problem with the skin…if there is any dimpling,Liverpool FC Jersey 18/19, if the nipple, which was everted normally, is inverted, if there is any discharge,Nike Air Max Australia Cheap, or any inflammation or infection of the breast…you need to check for lumps,” the Oncologist noted.He noted that while some inflammatory lumps may turn out to be a mere abscess, inflammatory breast cancer has been proven to be one of the most aggressive types of cancer. “People need to check their breasts…they need to feel if there is a lump in the breast (but) not all lumps are malignant (cancerous); some lumps are benign (not cancerous),” Dr. Niamatali assured.Benign lumps are merely an abnormal growth of cells. However, cancerous lumps develop with two other properties, that is, having the ability to invade local tissues or to metastasise. According to Dr. Niamatali, “cancer can go to the brain, it can go from one breast to another, to the bone, to the kidney; almost anywhere.”When metastasisation occurs, it usually means that stages three and four of the disease have already started to manifest. “We can’t deal with cancer at these stages,” Dr. Niamatali admitted. He, however, noted that “we try to do two things…we try to improve the quality of life by giving them whatever treatment they need. We try to prolong their lives as long as we can,” the Oncologist added.But according to him, while efforts are being made to reduce the prevalence of all types of cancers, there is still need for more efforts to be trained on dealing with the different types of breast cancer. Breast Cancer awareness month is observed annually in October and according to Dr. Niamatali, “we need to do a lot more in terms of treating breast cancer correctly. By this I mean we need to look at certain markers, doing certain tests called immunohistochemistry (the process of detecting antigens) to clearly define which patient will benefit from what because one size don’t fit everybody.”“We are working on this,” assured Dr. Niamatali as he stressed “we want to prevent cancer, we want to diagnose it early and we want to treat it correctly.”While breast cancer has been found to be the leading cancer that claims the life of older women, an appeal was last year made by then Director of Chronic Disease within the Ministry of Public Health, Dr. Morris Edwards, for all women to immediately embrace self breast examination.”Ladies start doing your ‘self examinations’ if you don’t (already), and every female that you know, ‘each one teach one, meet one’. Let’s promote the word – start doing the examination or they will be a part of the statistics,” Dr. Morris told a gathering consisting of several women.Breast cancer has been found to not only be the most prevalent cancer among women but it is the overall leading cancer in Guyana.According to Dr. Edwards, breast cancer accounted for almost 17 percent or 1,090 cases of the cancers that were diagnosed in the country over the period 2003 through 2012. This is based on data compiled by the Guyana Cancer Registry that were drawn from both public and private health facilities.He was able to decipher from the data, which is now contained in the 2015 Cancer Surveillance Report,Wholesale MLB Jerseys Pro Shop, that the incidence and mortality rates were highest in women older than 65 years and peaked in those aged 70-74 years.”So breast cancer in our setting is a disease of older women. Don’t wait until you are in your 60s to have your screening,Cheap Nike Football Jerseys, your mammograms or whatever, do it before then because of the mortality rate; you diagnose and you die soon after,Maglietta Roma Bambino,” informed Dr. Morris.He also disclosed the fact that Afro-Guyanese women had the highest Cumulative Incidence Rate (CIR). This, according to Dr. Edwards, translated to almost 400 women per 100,000 population, being inflicted with the disease. |
