The wonderful moment with my lovely kids was possible due
to the progress made by medical science
When the contest was organized on Indiblogger by ApolloHospitals on the topic ‘How Modern Day Healthcare is Touching Lives’, I felt
highly obliged to participate as it has a great significance in my life. My
Dad, Mom, Sister and I have been through cancer; in addition I have a specialneeds daughter who had to undergo two triple fusion corrective surgeries on her
feet. Thus, I have had opportunity to look at healthcare and its effects on
lives of people from close quarters.
17 years ago when I was diagnosed with Infiltrating
Carcinoma, grade III with 10 positive nodes, the ground seemed to slip away
from beneath my feet. Today with the progress in medical science I am more
confident and would not feel as scared and desperate as I felt back then. Even though
it was in 1996 when India lagged behind the developed nations that I went
through cancer, I owe the 17 years of my life to medical science, which allowed
me to take care of my kids, be there for my family and live to realize many of
my dreams. I had wasted away my life living everyday monotonously until cancer
happened. It was the awakening call for me to live my life fruitfully. So, I can
say the past 17 years of my life after cancer have been the best of my life. I am
grateful to medical science and my wonderful doctor who made this possible for
me.
When my daughter started crouching and could not walk
properly, an orthopedic surgery on her feet allowed her to walk more
comfortably. When my Dad fell down and broke his hip bone in old age, we
assumed that is the end of his mobility, until the orthopedic surgeon showed us
how easy it was to replace a hip. So we can say that modern day health care is
having a great influence on our quality of life, making it possible for us to
fight against odds and triumph.
Back in 1996, as I heard the words “You have Cancer”, when breast
feeding my 11 month old baby girl who had been diagnosed with brain atrophy, I can
shamelessly confess that I was desperate to survive. I did not want to leave
behind my two kids orphaned and die, especially not my daughter who needed
special care and attention. I had to
undergo mastectomy, chemotherapy and other treatments to overcome cancer. Today
everything looks so distant, as though that did not happen to me at all. But
the scar on my chest says, it did happen to me, and I lost a part of my body to
survive.
People tell me that I am lucky to be alive, when so many
have lost their lives to cancer, even those who could afford any treatment in
any corner of the world, therefore I should not fret about losing my breast,
living with a scar on my chest nor about suffering side-effects of
chemotherapy. I choose to differ. I know
I am grateful to be alive and kicking today, but then I have every right to
fret about my suffering because I did suffer a lot going through the treatment
and I do suffer even to this day due to mastectomy. Would I be fretting and fuming over my
suffering if I had the opportunity to get the best care like the one provided
by Apollo Hospitals back then? With innovation in key medical specialities and
superspecialities which match the ones available in developed nations, cancer
survivors need not bother with mastectomies and prosthetics anymore now, at
least not in all cases. With the help of robotic precision surgeries, more and
more patients have option of getting the tumor removed while preserving the
organs. The preventive check-ups and let us have peace of mind, making sure
there is no recurrence taking place, or when it does to nip it in the bud.
My sister was terrified of the after effects of cancer
treatment, therefore decided to never go for surgery or chemotherapy thus
losing her battle with cancer in 1996. My mom was quite late in being diagnosed
with breast cancer and therefore the treatment that followed was not
successful. Also she did not realize the importance of chemotherapy in cancer
treatment. She had two recurrences in two years time and finally lost her
battle with cancer on 1st January 2006. Would it be the same case if
they could avail the best cancer care treatment provided by the superspeciality
hospitals in India now? Within a decade the whole scenario has changed and
cancer patients now have comprehensive state-of-the-art facilities and a
coordinated multidisciplinary approach for the treating cancer of all types. The
present hospitals with their modern setups, the colorful uniformed nurses and
very friendly doctors who explain things properly to the patient could have
saved the lives of my Mom and my Sister. Sigh!!!
Technology like the Positron Emission Tomography (PET) which
is a powerful imaging technique for the diagnosis of cancer, the Cyber knife that
provides unparalleled access to tumors anywhere in the body, and now the
Novalis radiosurgery platform provide better treatment of cancer aiming at
greater precision, faster treatment delivery, more flexible treatment
scheduling and a higher level of patient comfort, thus reducing chances of recurrence and
improving chances of survival, moreover without
compromising on the quality of life.
The modern healthcare provides medical treatment in areas
like Radiosurgery, Novalis TX, Cyberknife, Liver Transplant, Bone Marrow
Transplant, Hand & Microsurgery, Infertility Care, Cosmetic Surgery, Oral
& Maxillofacial Surgery, Birmingham Hip Resurfacing, Stem Cell Transplant, Emergency
& Trauma, Services, Minimally Invasive Coronary Artery Surgery, Bariatric
Surgery, MRI-HIFU - Non-Surgical treatment of Uterine Fibroids, Robotic
Surgery, The Renaissance Robotic Surgical System, PET-MR Suite, and the latest G
scan - an Open Standing MRI scanner which have revolutionized health care.
The specialities include heart, orthopedics, spine, cancer care,
gastroenterology, neurosciences, nephrology and urology, critical care and
preventive health care. All this being
under one roof ensures that the patient need not worry about anything and need
not visit different hospitals for every different kind of treatment.
Thus we can say that hospitals like Apollo have brought
about the change in healthcare and preventive health check-ups, robotic
surgeries and organ transplants which has enabled people diagnosed with cancer
or any other serious ailments to live a stress free life without becoming
victims to diseases. From the time when people would visit foreign lands for
treatment, today we have a thriving medical tourism industry in India where
people even from developed nations are coming over for treatment in India. That is a great leap in the medical field for our country.