North Hospital Center Chemotherapy Suspension: Impact on Patients’ Health and Advocacy for Change

2023-08-29 22:23:31

The northern hospital center suspends certain services from the beginning of September, for lack of funding. Among them, chemotherapy. The support association for cancer patients intends to defend the interests of patients and warns regarding the effects on their health.

The announcement had the effect of a bomb at the end of July. For financial reasons, services from the North hospital center will be suspended at the three sites of Koné, Poindimié and Koumac, from Monday 4 September. And the hearing of the CHN by Congress did nothing. Chemotherapy is part of the care that will be stopped.

The association Oktobre rose, which takes care of people with cancer in the North province, is sounding the alarm. This decision will have serious consequences for patients.

Thirty people are currently undergoing chemotherapy in the North. They will now have to go to the Médipôle de Koutio to receive their care. With the key to long trips that will cause fatigue in patients.

The side effects of chemo are going to be greater. You should know that there are treatments that last one or two hours, there are some that last twenty to thirty minutes, or there are some that last five minutes, it all depends on the type of treatment. So people will have to leave Poindimié at 2 a.m. to return at 8 p.m. in the evening for a chemo session that will last ten minutes. For Koumac, it’s the same thing“explains Valérie Crespin, the president of the Oktobre rose association.

The association also denounces a decision which, economically speaking, is not so advantageous either: “Some services must close on Friday (September 1st) on the North health pole, so they will take the ambulance. It has additional costs, while it can be done on the side“.

But the biggest risk is that some patients stop treatment.

There are people who are not going to want to travel, who are not going to want to go to Nouméa for their chemo. They are in the North with teams they trust, who have been following them for several months” emphasizes Valérie Crespin.

The association intends to get in touch with “those who made this decision to make them change their minds. For me, it is abnormal that people from the North province go for treatment in the South province while the PSN (North health center) was established in 2018 “.

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