Ignorance about breast cancer taking lives of thousands

Lahore: A lack of awareness and ignorance about breast cancer is taking the lives of thousands of Pakistani females belonging to all age groups.

Abida Raza, 60, is one such patient battling against the fatal disease. A lump in her breast is what she took so lightly a few years back, without realising it would one day give her a horrifying shock, a shock that turn her life upside down. It was not until last June she felt unbearable soreness in the chest, forcing her to have a diagnosis, but it was all too late by then.

Doctors at the Shalamar Hospital in Lahore finally discharged the Pakistan Railways employee yesterday, telling her relatives that the breast cancer patient was beyond the treatment stage and she only had a few months to live.

Abida doesn't agree with her brother's theory that by going to the best hospital at the last stage of cancer, she could have saved her life.

"Had I opted for a better and hence a more expensive hospital, the little money that I had, would not have lasted more than three months and the results would have still been the same.

"How many people can defeat cancer in its last stage? Out of my post-retirement dues amounting to Rs4,12,500 (Dh25000), I have already spent Rs3,30,000 (Dh20,000) on my treatment during these last 12 months.

"Had I known I would not survive; I would have kept this entire amount for my son's matrimony. The doctors kept on giving me hope and I kept on spending on my treatment."

Pakistan has the highest rate of breast cancer for any Asian population accounting to 40,000 deaths per year. Research has revealed that approximately 1 in 9 women will suffer from the disease at some point in their lives.

Abida, a university graduate, knows well about her fate today but is more worried about her 80-year old ailing mother and her young son's marriage.

"I am on the death-bed now, waiting for the inevitable to happen, but my major worry is my mother. She is very old and may not absorb the shock of my demise. I also wish to see my son getting married before I embark upon my eternal journey," she said.

She regrets the fact she had lent a deaf ear to one of her lady colleagues, who had once advised her to go for regular clinical breast examinations.

"I ignored her suggestion. Had I listened to her carefully then, a check-up at an early stage could have resulted in down-staging the cancer."

Talking to Gulf News in Lahore yesterday, a cancer specialist at the Shaukat Khanum Cancer Hospital Lahore opined, "It is a pity that there hardly are any national screening programmes for breast cancer in Pakistan.

"Educating women about the risks of breast cancer constitutes the first step towards early detection of breast cancer, so that women are enabled to judge their risk and take relevant measures."