Breast cancer congress key to improving patient care, say UAE specialists

Last weekend's conference in Dubai, run by the Emirates Medical Association in collaboration with the UAE Ministry of Health and the Dubai Health Authority, was attended by more than 150 oncologists, radiologists, pathologists, surgeons, family physicians, cancer nurses, and screening technicians.

Delegates heard presentations on best practice in screening, diagnosis, treatment and after care of the disease, delivered by a number of the UAE's top oncologists and surgeons, as well as regional and international breast cancer experts - including eight visiting specialists from the US's MD Anderson Cancer Center.

"A conference like this will help to ensure that everyone gets first-class treatment in the future," said Dr. Mohamed Jaloudi, Chief of Medical Oncology at Tawam Johns Hopkins Hospital, who chaired one of the conference sessions.

"It is every healthcare professional's duty to keep up-to-date with the latest medical knowledge in their area of expertise, and to implement changes, in agreement with their colleagues, to improve care. Of particular important for early diagnosis is the education of those in the front-line of care, such as family physicians and primary health care professionals. They need to have basic knowledge of breast cancer so they know what to look for during an examination and when to refer onto specialists," he explained.

Dr. Farid Khalifa, Head of the Medical Oncology Department at Dubai Hospital added: "Conferences where international and UAE specialists get together to discuss best practices, and learn from each other, are very important for the development of cancer care in the region. We will all go away having learnt something from here, and having formed new allegiances, which will undoubtedly help us to improve care in our own centers."

Examples of new updates on breast cancer care discussed at the conference included a session looking at the latest data on the treatment of post-menopausal women with endocrine responsive node-positive disease, following surgery.
Data published in the New England Journal of Medicine (NEJM) on the 19th of August 2009 shows that treating this group with letrozole for five years post-surgery reduces the risk of the disease spreading to other parts of the body by 15% [1].

The drug also reduced the risk of patients' suffering a relapse of breast cancer by 12%, compared with the patients receiving other types of drug treatment, according to the data which was presented by Dr. Hamdy Abdul Azzim, Professor of Clinical Oncology at Cairo University.

"The findings constitute a significant change in practice for those caring for breast cancer patients in the region, as up to 60 percent of women with the disease are node-positive. The high proportion of node-positive patients is because women are generally diagnosed in our region when their disease is at a more advanced stage," Dr. Azzim noted.