Most patients given wrong treatment

cost for the next three years and these are neither evaluated nor explained.

Dr Krishna Mohan, medical oncologist at the IndoAmerican Cancer Hospital, said, “Cost factors are a strain and we do see many cases daily where further treatment is a matter of concern. Those who come with these problems are put through the patient support programme and they are aided through these sectors.”

Dr Mohan said treatment was costly when the patients come with advanced stage cancer. “If diagnosed early and treated early the price is not a problem,” he said.

The problem is that the maximum number of cases in India are diagnosed in Stage 3 and Stage 4. Those who can’t afford treatment often never come back. Those who return want to know if there is a second option of treatment available for them.

In such cases, oncologists state that they give the patients the second line of treatment where survival is not guaranteed but other problems are controlled. As many as eighty per cent of the patients had a change in the treatment and 14 per cent undergo wrong cancer treatment according to a study carried out on 300 people by a Hyderabad-based start up onco.com, which has been accepted by the American Society of Clinical Oncology.

The start up approached 10,000 patients in the last one year, from India, South East Asia and eastern Europe.

Dr Amit Jotwani, a senior consultant oncologist and co-founder of the company explained, “It is very important to get the right treatment for cancer. For this reason, we give in writing to our patients what the right treatment would be and ask them to get it treated from the doctor and hospital of their choice. Our goal is to give the right information so