Rising above a community of butcher shops and fruit vendors in old Cairo, flanked by the historic Aqueduct of the Nile, the Children’s Cancer Hospital Egypt 57357 (CCHE) is quite the sight to see. With two enormous mesh structures billowing like sails in the wind, and its blue-green windows that defy the dusty layer of […]
Our latest blogpost is from Mr Craig Opie, a radiation therapist/dosimetrist educator from Sydney, Australia. He has recently returned from a 6 month posting, where he trained and worked alongside staff at the Yangon General Hospital. Through recounting his experience, Craig explains how a volunteer role can lead to significant benefits for LMIC radiotherapy departments […]
I had the pleasure of working as a radiation therapy technologist (RTT)/dosimetrist mentor in the Radiation Oncology Department at Yangon General Hospital (YGH), from July to December 2016. The role was organised through Australian Volunteers International. I normally work as an RTT/dosimetrist clinical educator at the Northern Sydney Cancer Centre, Royal North Shore Hospital, Sydney, […]
Happy new year! We celebrate the new year by sharing GlobalRT’s latest blog post from Dr Biniyam Tefera Deressa, clinical oncologist from Ethiopia. He outlines the challenges facing cancer care in Ethiopia by telling the story of a patient with breast cancer, Abeba. He also tells the remarkable story of the development of Ethiopia’s second […]
Dr. Biniyam Tefera Deressa University of Gondar, Ethiopia Email: biniyamtefera.md@gmail.com Two years ago, in January 2015, Dr Daniel Rauch, a Swiss oncologist, and ! were in Gondar, Northwest Ethiopia to evaluate the first cancer patients. Until that day there was no dedicated cancer treatment in the University of Gondar Hospital. Our first patient, Abeba*, came […]
By Jake Van Dyk The recent Lancet Oncology Commission report on Expanding Global Access to Radiotherapy indicated that more than 22,000 Medical Physicists will be needed over the next 20 years to address the rising cancer crisis in low-to-middle income countries. Medical Physicists Without Borders (MPWB) (www.mpwb.org ) is a new volunteer organization with a […]
In the latest series of blog posts, Njeri Mbure, a public relations worker in Boston (now turned global health advocate), reports on the radiotherapy situation in her home country of Kenya. Her article highlights the need for basic infrastructure in several African nations, as the incidence of cancer continues to rise. Read More
“Only the wearer knows where the shoe pinches most,” so the idiom goes, but it’s a fair representation to thousands of cancer patients in Kenya. While radiotherapy services do not cost an arm and a leg as compared to charges abroad, the challenge here is unique; the availability of radiotherapy machines for the majority poor […]
Continuing with our latest stream of blog posts on global health electives, Shekinah Elmore, a fourth year medical student at Harvard Medical School, shares her experience in Kampala, Uganda. Read More
I immediately recognized the simple blue-green door marked with the words “RADIATION AREA” in bold, red letters. Recognize is perhaps too strong a word: I had seen it in a New York Times photograph. It was shut, as it had been in the photo, meaning that the machine was working, as it nearly always was. […]
