The National Hospital Abuja has assured of its continuous support in the fight against cancer as the world commemorates cancer day 2022.
This year’s commemoration was themed “Close The Care Gap”, which attracted players and stakeholders in the health sector as well as cancer survivors, who shared experiences and success stories.
Speaking during the commemoration event at the Radiotherapy Centre at the hospital in Abuja on Friday, the Chief Medical Director of the NHA Dr Jafaru Momoh said, “We are quite happy to celebrate this year, it marks the year in which we are really beginning to get more commitment into cancer treatment and all the advocacies we have done in the past are beginning to yield fruit and we are happy that our equipment is functioning; the CT, the Radiotherapy equipment, and we just bought a new equipment as well which has been installed and training is ongoing to put it to use within a few days from now.”
Momoh assured that additional wards will be open in the hospital in a couple of weeks or months, adding that the hospital is in the process of recruiting more nurses to ensure quality care for cancer patients.
“We are going to open up the additional wards in a couple of weeks or months, once we get the staff to man the place.
“We are in the process of recruiting more nurses. We have the ward here that is already fully equipped and once we complete the recruitment process we will be able to open up the additional ward for admissions specifically of cancer patients. Right now the cancer patients are scattered in various wards apart from the chemotherapy floor which we have already opened here.
“For routine admissions, you may not need to go to the surgical ward, by the time you are diagnosed and already with the oncologist, the next admission will be right here in the new building; those are the things we are putting in place in the National hospital to make our patients feel comfortable.
He added that the hospital as a whole needs to be fully functional for cancer patients to benefit, “that’s why our focus is not just in this department,” he said.
He assured that the hospital will continue to support cancer care at various levels in all departments.
