Cancer Centre for the North needs help

The enhanced treatment beds would not only save patients time when receiving treatment but allow for the treatment of more patients.

“There is a waitlist, yeah, for that treatment and there are other treatments we’re doing. So if we take 45 minutes or an hour and a half to treat one patient, that will delay other people getting on the treatment machine. But if you can treat multiple sites in the same beam, you could reduce it from, say, over an hour to twenty minutes or so.”

But the new treatment beds would also help the local oncologists to do some groundbreaking research trials. Previously, when a cancer spread from, say, the prostate to another location on the body, such as the lungs, that patient was considered palliative. But the folks in Prince George have been involved with international research to find a way to cure cancer even when it has spread.

“Now we’re leading the Phase Three trials, actually, from Prince George, and they’re international trials in many countries and we’re trying to design new trials after that. First, it was to see if ‘Should we do it?’ then we said ‘Is it safe?’ And now what we’re asking is ‘Can we do it faster?’ So, “Can we do it all in one treatment?'”

Local philanthropist Selen Alpay recently launched the campaign to raise a million dollars with his own $100,000 donation and the local Cancer Centre, which celebrates its tenth year in 2022, needs help in raising the funds to improve this life-saving technology. If you feel inclined to help, visit the BC Cancer Foundation’s website.

by Cheryl Jahn

Cancer Centre for the North needs help

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