Students praise work of cancer unit, staff

By GABRIEL LAHOC
MEDICAL staff  at the national cancer treatment centre in the Angau Memorial General Hospital, Lae, are regarded as angels without wings, by cancer patients from around the country.
They work under the country’s only radio oncologist Dr John Niblett at the centre which is a separate unit in the department of health.
But getting to know them a little more, one will be  surprised to find out that this small team of dedicated nurses, technicians, doctors and administration staff are engaged in cancer work.
Their faces do not show the stress involved and their smiles seem to assure patients that everything will be fine.
The centre has the only cobalt machine in the country.
This was seen on the face of Dr Mana Arios, who in the middle of his response to questions posed by visiting students from the University of Papua New Guinea, smiled and said despite the challenges, they still managed.
The Morobe students had earlier presented K2,000 and K200 worth of toiletries to the centre and were invited by Niblett to tour the wards and treatment centre.
They were told by Arios and radio therapist Fore Samaudingke that they needed a minimum of three more cobalt machines and at least 10 trained personnel stationed in each region of the country to deal with the increasing number of people diagnosed with cancer.
Arios said the service offered at the centre had been non-existent in the past decade since the last machine broke down and the operations in the centre were done by specialists.
Cervical cancer patients dominated those occupying the 36 beds available at the two cancer wards at Angau hospital.
Any donation and assistance, Niblett said, would  greatly assist the centre.
The university students believe that any funding from the national government to train more specialists and then expand out into the other provinces would be money well spent.