All about CAN-SUR-VIVE
Anyone who wishes to join and any person or corporate who wishes to support the CAN- SURVIVE Trust may call its hotline: 0713 161616 or email: cansurvivetrust@gmail.com
Currently on the Trust’s register are more than 200 who have survived breast and gynaecological cancer including one man who has survived male breast cancer. People have joined the Trust from far and nigh – Colombo, Gampaha, Kalutara, Galle, Kurunegala, Badulla, Mahiyanganaya and Kekirawa.
The half- day motivational quarterly sessions held by the Trust have been very interactive, with anyone being able to ask any questions, while experts address various physical, medical, psychological, spiritual and financial issues of survivors, pro- viding professional solutions. Dietary advice, cookery demonstrations, regular exercise programmes, Yoga exercises and pointers on meditation and looking after their physical appearances are also part of these meetings, two sessions of which have been sponsored by Lanka Hospital and two more by Jetwing Hotels.
The eight-member Trust comprises Chairman Bede Johnpillai, a former planter; Secretary & Consultant Oncological Surgeon Dr. Naomal Perera of Lanka Hospitals in Colombo 5; Treasurer Priyalal Edirisinghe, a Chartered Accountant; Jerome Chanmugam, a Chartered Accountant; Consultant Oncologist Dr. Wasantha Rathnayake attached to the National Cancer Institute, VIVE Trust established in April this year, mooted by Dr. Perera.
“I feel that the answer to the Why? I had on my mind when I got breast cancer has come now. I’m ‘chosen’ from above to spread the message that people who are affected by cancer can beat it and lead a normal life,” says Sandy.
Although the idea of forming a support group for cancer survivors took root in the mind of Dr. Perera soon after he came back from his specialist training in the United Kingdom in 2003, it took awhile to gather like-minded people around him.
Earlier while conducting a research, Dr. Perera had attempted to trace about 450 patients who had been treated for breast cancer between 1998 and 2001 at the National Cancer Institute, Maharagama. Getting their addresses from the hospital register, he had sent off letters, only to find that nearly half got returned, with the stamp ‘No such person at this address’. When he raised a fuss that the hospital register was wrong, his Director had told him that most people who were affected by cancer gave bogus addresses as there was huge stigma attached to this disease. This was the experience which set him on the path of establishing the Trust to stand by the survivors and also dispel the stigma.
“Do you know what the No. 1 killer in Sri Lanka is,” he asks, replying without hesitation that it is heart disease and not cancer. It is lung cancer which is within the first 10 killers and not breast cancer.
“It is the fear of cancer which is deadly,” says Dr. Perera, urging women to check their breasts for lumps and growths, however tiny they may be, seek treatment immediately and be a survivor.