Basseterre, St. Kitts, March 07, 2016 (SKNIS): Minister of Health, Honourable Eugene Hamilton, assured residents of St. Kitts and Nevis that they will soon have access to a state-of-the-art cancer treatment centre right here in the Federation during last month’s sitting of the National Assembly.
He noted that cancer care is of much concern to his ministry, particularly considering that between 2010 and 2014 there were 371 new cases of cancer, not including skin cancer. He said this gives an average of 74 persons per year, the rate being 15 persons for every 10,000 persons in the population. He said this rate is trending downward in that in 2010 there were 92 new cases.
“However, the challenge is the Federation has a cancer profile identical to the wealthiest nations in the world and we should be concerned about that,” Minister Hamilton said noting that quite early in his term as Minister of Health, he visited the Cancer Centre, Eastern Caribbean in Antigua, which he described as a first class institution. “Since then, we have been engaging in talks with the owners and specialists from that institution, hopefully to formalize an agreement very shortly for our own oncologist unit.”
In February, Minister Hamilton attended a networking cocktail of the Cancer Centre, Eastern Caribbean held in St. Kitts where Dr. Conville Brown, President and Chief Executive Officer of the Medical Pavilion, Bahamas, who was key to the establishment of the centre in Antigua, explained that the Cancer Centre, St. Kitts and Nevis would provide chemotherapy treatment, but the more expensive and complex radiation therapy would be provided in Antigua.
“One of the reasons for coming into St. Kitts is to help to launch the Cancer Centre, St. Kitts and Nevis,” Dr. Brown said. “Based on our hub and spokes model – wherein in Antigua, the main cancer centre is there, that’s where the radiation therapy will be performed but you don’t want to replicate that expensive bit of architecture and equipment in every island because the populations can’t support it. And so one would have to travel to Antigua for radiation therapy.”
During the National Assembly, Minister Hamilton thanked the hosts of the cancer networking session, Scott and Connie James, who he said informed that they had already raised $60,000 toward the new centre and were pursuing more funding.
At the networking session, Dr. Brown had revealed that the establishment of the centre in the Federation was part of an Organisation of the Eastern Caribbean States (OECS) model. He said that it was the OECS Authority that had invited him to establish the centre in Antigua.
Currently, the Cancer Centre, Eastern Caribbean based in Antigua was said to have the latest radiation therapy in the marketplace.
Dr. Brown explained that there were special arrangements for patients who were wards of the government because they did not have insurance or could not afford private care.
“And for those patients, we’ve already been able to implement a system whereby for a price of US$10,000 whether you need radiation therapy for four weeks, six weeks, eight, 10 or 12 weeks, - and with the highest level of sophistication – there’s that flat price,” he said. “It makes it easy for the governments to budget, given the size of the populations and of course it therefore improves access. We’re very proud of that model.”
In 2009 the Heads of Government of the OECS countries gave Dr. Brown a mandate to implement a model for cancer care in the region. This gave rise to the establishment and operation of the Cancer Centre, Eastern Caribbean in Antigua on July 01, 2015 and opened the way for the previously mentioned networking session in St. Kitts and the developing plans for cancer care clinics in other OECS countries. The clinics are expected to operate in tandem with the main facility in Antigua and Barbuda.
Minister Hamilton demonstrated support for the arrangement, noting that with the establishment of the cancer care centre in St. Kitts, chemotherapy will be provided at the Joseph N. France General Hospital, but further advanced care will continue to be provided in Antigua.
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