Pakistan woman undergoes breast cancer operation in city

Vadodara: A 30-year-old lady from Pakistan successfully underwent operation at a city-based hospital for breast cancer.
Fatima Bilal Lateef, a resident of Rawalpindi from Pakistan's Punjab province, got operated for breast cancer on Friday at Sterling Cancer Hospital.

"Initially, I was very hesitant and was under constant fear. But I met doctors here, the staff was very good to me and gradually all negativity that I had in my mind got over. Now, I am very positive about my future," said Fatima, who came on a wheelchair to share her experience at the cancer survivors' meet.

The hospital had organized the meet ahead of World Cancer Day that falls on Sunday. Fatima thanked the team of cancer surgeons Dr Jatin Desai and Dr Dipayan Nandy, who operated her.

Talking about the radiotherapy facilities in the city, Dr Ashish Kumar, MD, radiotherapy, said in terms of population, the city has better radiotherapy facilities.

According to him, while metros like Delhi and Mumbai have 26 to 27 and 25 radiotherapy machines against population of 3 crore to 2 crore respectively, Vadodara is home to nearly six radiotherapy centres.

He, however, said presently not a single hospital in private or public sector in the country is equipped with proton beam technology.

The technology uses a high-energy beam of protons to deliver radiotherapy for patients reducing risk of damaging the surrounding healthy organs.