GUWAHATI:
In a bid to intensify the battle against cancer, the World Health Organization (WHO) in association with the Assam Health Ministry is coming up with a Tobacco Cessation Clinic at North East Cancer Hospital and Research Institute (NECHRI) at Amerigog in Jorabat, Kamrup district.
To be set up by a United Kingdom (UK)-based organisation, Centre for Health Research and Education (CHRE), patients will be offered free treatment at the clinic.
This was disclosed by NECHRI Managing Director and Research head Dr Munindra Narayan Baruah at the World Cancer Day programme held at the hospital premises on Friday.
Once set up, the centre will be the third in the region. Two centres are already operating in Guwahati and Mizoram. Since 2002, 16 such centres are operating in Anand, Bhopal, Bangalore, Chandigarh, Chennai, Cuttack, Delhi (2), Goa, Jaipur, Lucknow, Mumbai, Patna, Thiruvananthapuram, Kolkata and Hyderabad.
The services offered at the clinic include behavioural counselling, medication, and nicotine replacement therapy. “There will be a doctor and a nurse and other medical and paramedical staff in the clinic for treatment of patients,” Baruah said.
CHRE will also conduct a series of cancer awareness camps in various part of the Northeast beginning with Maiong in Meghalaya’s Ri-Bhoi district on February 27, Baruah added. “We have already conducted a camp in Nongpoh in Ri-Bhoi district in April, last year,” he said.
“The increasing number of cancer patients in the Northeast has been a matter of concern for all. In Meghalaya, 123 cancer patients have been detected per 1 lakh individuals. In Mizoram and Assam (Kamrup district) those numbers are 184 and 148, respectively. The number of stomach cancer patients has been alarmingly increasing in Mizoram,” he said.