DOHA: Hamad Medical Corporation's National Center for Cancer Care and Research (NCCCR) has launched a new treatment service for Qatari patients with prostate and breast cancers.
Through the new service, patients will be given the prescribed chemotherapy injections at home on the scheduled dates according to the treatment plan by a trained nursing team affiliated with NCCCR.
Speaking to Qatar News Agency (QNA), Dr Mohammed Salem Al Hassan, CEO and Medical Director of NCCCR and Chairman Corporate Cancer Services at HMC, explained that the service was launched at the beginning of Ramadan, based on Qatar Cancer Plan 2023-2026 (QCP) which includes the provision of home care services for some cancer patients.
Dr Al Hassan noted that the home treatment service will be provided to bedridden patients, patients over the age of 65, or patients who cannot reach the hospital to receive treatment. Those patients will receive treatment at home and not just care.
Dr Al Hassan added that a medical team consisting of doctors and nurses has been allocated to visit the patient at his home and evaluate the condition to provide injection treatment at home; noting that the home treatment service is provided every Saturday.
Dr. Al Hassan indicated that providing home treatment for cancer patients was launched as part of the Qatar Cancer Plan which aims to treat all cancer patients in Qatar. The homecare service helped overcome one of the challenges to HMC, which is the inability of the elderly to come to the centre or the desire of some patients to receive treatment at home. He noted that 40 patients have benefited from the home chemotherapy service.
Pointing to the centre's future plans, DrAl Hassan said that NCCCR seeks to provide this type of home treatment daily to all cancer patients and to include other types of cancers, to relieve cancer patients of the burden of coming to the hospital to receive treatment. He noted that the centre launched another service for cancer patients last year, which is palliative homecare services for elderly patients whose treatment programmes have ended.
He also revealed many plans to increase the quality of cancer treatments, noting that Qatar Cancer Plan 2023-2026 aims to enhance the quality of current services, adopt innovative and patient-friendly technology, and introduce new national programs for early cancer detection in Qatar.
Outpatient clinics at the National Center for Cancer Care and Research receive nearly 6,000 monthly visitors.