Speaking about the challenges facing the fight against breast cancer in Latin Americasome experts cite the lack of data statistics on the disease, which makes it difficult to establish prevention strategies, diagnosis and treatment.
The minister of Public healthVíctor Atallah, who pointed out that in Dominican Republic The authorities work in a registration program of tumors for cancers that affect both the child and adult populations.
“We are working with the Sisalril and with the risk insurers to have that data,” said the official at the conclusion of the launch of the project “Connectivity and digital access for the Pediatric Oncology unit of the Incart“, promoted by the Dominican Institute of Telecommunications.
The minister added: “The digitization of the entire system is the essential part to achieve that (the record), and that’s what we’re working on initially. Until the entire system is digitized, obtaining that data is going to be a little difficult.”
He said that they implement a pilot program throughout the country to have those data. “The most important thing of all is that, from there, all the data will be used to generate policies that improve patient care,” said Atallah.
Cases in the Incart
“We see that this year there was an increase in cases of breast cancer: have 2,447 patients diagnosed,” reported the general director of the National Cancer Institute Rosa Emilia Sánchez Pérez de Tavares (Incart), Bianny Rosario, on the statistics of the patients who go to that center.
“This may be because the patients They go to checkups with more frequency and therefore we have the opportunity for a timely detection“said the specialist.
When asked about the impact of clear statistics about him breast cancerRosario maintained that these data “can give us, in the long term, guidelines to know what we should do and evaluate the progress we have made regarding this disease.”
Records in Latin America
During the forum “Advancing the patient journey: therapeutic approaches innovative for breast cancer“, developed by the EFE agency, experts in the medical area agreed that Latin America faces a challenge in the fight against breast cancer due to the lack of data and precise records that allow us to size the problem and design effective policies.
At the event, the specialists indicated that, without reliable statistics, it is almost impossible to establish prevention strategies, diagnosis and treatment.
“Generating results and policies on what is not known is enormously difficult,” warned the Dr. Diego Lucasdirector of the Clinical Research Department of the Riojano Integral Oncology Center, when assuring that “there is no mandatory statistics nor a database that accurately reflects the magnitude of cancer“.
