|
 With
increasing survival rates, quality of survival assumes a vital
significance in the field of cancer. It is estimated that in India every
year, 5,00,000 new cases of cancer are being diagnosed and that at any
given time, there would be approximately 2 million Indians suffering
from the disease. More than 50 percent of them need rehabilitation
services.
In view of the poor
economy, absence of social security legislation, different patterns and
standards of living and a fatalistic oriental philosophy towards life,
the rehabilitation techniques and methods in a developing country like
India have to be simpler, economical and well adapted to the social
milieu. Futhermore, a comprehensive system of rehabilitation services
should be organised within a shorter period, so as to keep pace with the
standards already existing in the developed countries.
These objectives were kept
in view by the Indian Cancer Society when it established the first
Rehabilitation Unit for cancer patients in India in 1961. A majority of
cancer patients, by the time they reach a hospital, are already in great
economic distress as most of their meager resources have been exhausted
from expenditure incurred on travel to a distant treatment centre and
the cost of prolonged treatment. In order to relieve economic distress
of such patients an experimental workshop was started by the Indian
Cancer Society in the corridors of the auditorium of the Tata Memorial
Hospital in 1962. Gradually over the years, this small sapling of
rehabilitation has flowered into a pilot demonstration project, the only
of its kind in Asia, providing specific and comprehensive rehabilitation
services from 8,000 to 10,000 cancer patients and their families every
year.
Details Of
The Services Provided
|
Rehabilitation of Cancer Patients