It is a new lease of life for a 65-year-old farmer S. Sambasiva Rao from Ammanabrolu village in Prakasam district as oncologists at Yashoda Hospital in Hyderabad performed a bone marrow transplant on him.
Presenting Mr. Sambasiva Rao before the media here on World Blood Cancer Day on Saturday, Dr. Ganesh S. Jaishetwar, a Fellow in Bone Marrow Transplant (BMT), said, “People suffering from blood cancers should not think that it is the end of the road. There is always room for hope.”
‘Need more awareness’
Dr. Ganesh underscored the need for raising awareness about blood cancer, supporting those affected by the disease, and working towards finding a cure. Cancer survivors sharing their success stories could encourage others suffering from the disease to come forward to take treatment.
Those having symptoms like cough, chest pain, frequent infections and fevers, unexplained rash, bruising, or bleeding, itchy skin, night sweats, loss of appetite or nausea, persistent weakness, and fatigue should get a complete blood count (CBC) test done which will help in early detection of blood cancer and could significantly improve the chances of survival, Dr. Ganesh said.
“Majority of blood cancers are curable with advanced treatment options like modern chemotherapy, Immunotherapy, BMT etc., which are now more effective and less toxic,” he said.
‘Targeted therapries are less toxic’
“Latest immunotherapy methods employing the CAR-T cells are targeted therapies which selectively kill blood cancer cells, leaving neighbouring healthy cells unaffected. This decreases toxicity and is highly successful in treating some types of blood cancers’‘.
Blood cancers constitute 8.2% of all cancers, and in India, its incidence is 5.5 cases per 1 lakh population per year. About 80,000 new blood cancer cases are detected per year, and one new blood cancer is reported every 7 seconds in India, and one person is dying from blood cancer every 20 seconds,” he said.
