National Hospital’s IVF, Cancer Centres Have Recorded Huge Success- CMD

Philip Daniel Yatai
Feb, Sun, 2024

Health

National Hospital’s IVF, cancer centres have recorded huge success- CMD

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By Folasade Akpan

The Chief Medical Director, National Hospital, Abuja (NHA), Prof. Muhammad Raji, on Sunday said the hospital’s In Vitro Fertilisation (IVF) and Cancer centres had recorded huge successes over time.

Mahmud disclosed this in Abuja, while speaking with the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN).

According to him, NHA, which began IVF in 2006, is probably the first or one of the first government hospitals to have an IVF centre.

He added that it was also about the cheapest and had, over the years, brought joy to a number of families who had lost hope.

“It has been quite successful, and I must applaud the people running it; they do it quietly. They don’t make so much noise about it.

“The doctors, nurses, embryologists do so much. If you visit our IVF centre, that is when you will know what dedication is.

“You need to be there every second of the way. Once you start a cycle, until you finish, you have to be with your client closely from the beginning till the end.

“That really demands a lot of dedication and patience, and you never hear them complain. We are really proud of them,” he said.

For the cancer centre, he said that NHA boasts of some of the best equipment for the treatment of cancer making the hospital’s cancer centre about the best.

“We have two Linear Accelerator (LINAC) machines which is one of the high-end radiotherapy treatment machines.

“We have a brachytherapy machine which can be used in the treatment of some enclosed cancers like cancer of the cervix and prostate cancers.

“We also have a nuclear medicine department.

“Nuclear medicine treats things like goitres and cancers of the thyroid gland and in other parts of the body.

“Beside chemotherapy, the hospital also engages in surgical oncology, so we have a holistic approach to cancer treatment.”

He explained that some centres carry out surgery to just treat the cancer, while patients were referred to another centre for chemotherapy.

“In some cases, if the patient does surgery in one centre, he or she has chemotherapy at that centre while radiation therapy and other things would have to be done elsewhere.

“But here, we have everything available, and we have also trained so many for the country.

“The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) has identified NHA as a very sound partner, so we work closely with them through the Nigeria Atomic Energy Commission.

“Now that the National Institute for Cancer Research and Treatment (NICRAT) has also been created, we have started working closely with them.

“So, we have treated thousands of patients with cancer.

“A number of them have been treated to cure, some that are advanced have been treated palliatively to make their lives better till God determines.

“We have never pushed away a case of cancer and we lose so much money because before a patient comes to NHA in terms of cancer, he must have tried so many other places.

“Some have tried herbalists and even when they go to hospitals, it is not all doctors or facilities that can immediately detect cancer.

“So, by the time a patient eventually comes to us, he or she must have expended a lot of money.”

He further explained that cancer and trauma were two things that could run a whole extended family into poverty because of how expensive they could be in terms of treatment.

He added that once they come to the hospital, they try to treat them as much as possible and once they commence treatment, especially chemotherapy, they never drop them.

“Some patients are unable to pay but the hospital just finds a way of subsidising it for them to go through it,” he said. (NAN)

Edited by Abiemwense Moru/Ephraims Sheyin

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