Free cancer ward looking for sponsors
Seven-year-old M. Karthik undergoing treatment at Sri Ramakrishna Institute of Oncology and Research.Four-year-old A. Anish of Thathamangalam in Palakkad district of Kerala fiddles with the stethoscope around a doctor’s neck at Sri Ramakrishna Institute of Oncology and Research here. He feels its shape, trying to figure out what it is. Anish cannot see as he has been blinded by retino blastoma – a cancer in the eye.Wearing a pair of plastic goggles, Anish sits hunched on the bed in the free cancer ward for children staring at nothing. What goes on in the little boy’s mind is hard to know as he does not even respond to questions from the doctor.Anish will not regain sight, but he will live on because his medical expenses are being met by the doctors themselves and the hospital will not charge a bed fee. His is among the 15 beds in the free ward that the hospital offers as a solace to the parents of children from the economically weak sections.“But, the free beds and waiver of doctors’ fee alone will not do. We need contributions from philanthropists to meet the expenses of chemotherapy and radiotherapy,” says Director of the institute P. Guhan.
S. Sindhuja (14) suffers from acute lymphoblastic leukaemia (a type of blood cancer). She needs Rs. 3 lakh to Rs. 4 lakh for treatment, says Dr. Guhan. The income her family gets from agriculture is too low to meet the expenses. Seven-year-old M. Karthik has brain tumour. His father runs a small meat stall and cannot afford huge treatment costs.“These children are some of the cases that need a lot of help from philanthropists. We have cured about 30 children with such help and fee waiver by doctors ever since the free ward was opened in 2005,” Dr. Guhan says. The ward was opened with a corpus of Rs. 50 lakh donated by the family of an industrialist, Muthusamy Naidu, who died of cancer.
After that, help has come from some persons. Dr. Guhan says Managing Director of Kumaran Mills D. Krishnamoorthy contributed Rs. 5 lakh and his wife Rajini Krishnamoorthy, Correspondent of Vidya Niketan school gave Rs. 1 lakh to save the lives of six children.The free ward has taken up the case of even a 20-year-old boy, A.M. Gopinath, who is also suffering from blood cancer. The doctor says the boy is doing his undergraduate course in catering in the PSG College. People at the college had mobilised Rs.1 lakh, but the boy needs at least another Rs. 1.5 lakh for 25 per cent of the treatment that is left to be done.
“His mother is a widow and ekes out a living as a marginal farmer at Sathyamangalam in Erode district. If cured completely, Gopinath can get back to normal life in six months to a year,” says Dr. Guhan.The ward gets three to four new patients every month. It takes six months of treatment for blood cancer patients. Those with brain and bone cancer will have to come for treatment once in 21 days. While the treatment for blood cancer starts from Rs. 2.5 lakh, brain tumour treatment costs Rs. 3,000 a cycle (totally six cycles).
“We want to provide free treatment to poor children and restore them as healthy ones to the parents. But, a lot of contributions for these children needs to come from those who can understand their plight and provide funds,” says Dr. Guhan. The cost of cancer treatment can sap one, as much as the disease itself can. Philanthropists can also provide a cure.(Those interested in contributing can contact Dr. Guhan at 0422-4389797/4500203 or 94430-43881).
