Tata Cancer Hospital in Varanasi becomes lifeline for patients from North, East India

“I have to undergo chemotherapy once a month. As the hospital is just four and a half hours away from Gorakhpur, I am able to return home on the same day after my chemotherapy. Had it been Mumbai, I don’t know how I would have been able to travel every month for my radiation,” said Gupta. “This hospital has saved my life,” he added.

At TMH, nearly 50 per cent of the patients are from states like Uttar Pradesh, Bihar, Jharkhand, Chhattisgarh and West Bengal. Overburdened by patients, the waiting list at TMH goes upto two-three months. Often patients’ kin sleep on the footpaths near the hospital and patients drop out of treatment, which push up mortality rates. Providing a sense of relief, thousands of cancer patients like Gupta from these states have found new hope in the newly constructed MPMMCC hospital in Varanasi—the constituency of Prime Minister Narendra Modi.

To decentralise cancer treatment in India, Tata Memorial Centre (TMC) started MPMMCC with the Centre’s Department of Atomic Energy with a budget of Rs 650 crore. The hospital was constructed within 10 months that commenced in February 2019. They also constructed another 180-bed Homi Bhabha Cancer Hospital (HBCH), which has the second biggest paediatric oncology unit in the public sector after TMH.

From 2018 to October 25 this year, a total of 68,096 new registrations have been recorded at the hospital. In 2018, the hospital recorded 6,250 patients. Next year, it increased to 12,292. Amid the pandemic, while the total registration of patients dropped by nearly 46 per cent at TMH, MPMMCC witnessed a surge. Like Gupta, many patients were referred to MPMMCC, which surged to 14,438 in 2020 when the pandemic hit the nation and 17,894 in 2021. As of October 25, 2022, already 17,222 registrations have been recorded.

“Due to the overwhelming response from the northern regions, we have already achieved the target that was set for us for the next ten years. So, now we are going to ask for additional funds from the Centre for further extension of the hospital,” said Dr Pankaj Chaturvedi, the officer-in-charge of MPMMCC and HBCH.

Under MPMMCC, a new smaller centre would be established at Muzaffarpur in Bihar so that patients from the state can undergo their follow-up treatment there itself.

As per the data provided by MPMMCC, nearly 5-10 per cent of the patients are being referred to the hospital from TMH. Since May 1, 2018, a total of 7,377 patients have been referred from TMH to MPMMCC. Other than this, 12 have been referred from HBCH in Sangrur, Punjab; and three from HBCH in Vizag and another three from Dr Bhubaneswar Borooah Cancer Institute in Guwahati.

“As these patients hail from the same geographical location that are nearer to MPMMCC, they are being referred to us which not only help them reduce the expenditure in train journys and stay for treatment but also help to provide timely treatment. This has also helped to lessen the dropout rate due to better accessibility to state-of-art healthcare facilities,” said Dr Satyajit Pradhan, director of MPMMCC.

The hospital has high-quality state-of-the-art medical equipment like PET-CT, SPECT-CT among others which is helping in better diagnosis of the patients. The Nuclear Medicine Department is working round the clock just to meet the daily demand of 67-72 cases per day.

“Every new generation has to be better than the previous generation. So, we weren’t aiming to make another health facility like TMH but something better than that. Thus, in terms of equipment, it is much superior than other hospitals in the public sector in the Northern region of India,” said Dr Chaturvedi. Explaining further, he said that MPMMCC is the first public hospital to procure PET-CT in Uttar Pradesh that is also benefiting patients across other regions.

In the same time period, under the Nuclear Medicine Department, the hospital has conducted 16,961 PET-CT tests. Starting from 2021, a total of 3,610 SPECT-CT tests have been conducted. Dr Pradhan explained that these high-end testing costs an average of over Rs 2 lakh in private hospitals. But MPMMCC is doing it at a subsidised rate of around Rs 30,000.

Not only that, the hospital has conducted over 32,000 life-saving surgeries along with 2.09 lakh chemotherapies.

Along with providing treatment, the hospital which is also a research institute has started medical, paramedical and nursing courses. “We have an MD course in radiation oncology, an M.Ch course in Surgical Oncology along with other diploma courses which will help to create the manpower in India to provide better healthcare facilities to cancer patients,” said Dr Pradhan.

The hospital is involved in several clinical trials related to unique region-specific cancer trends. For instance, the centre is running a clinical trial to find out why the Gangetic belt has a high incidence of gall-bladder cancer. Also, another clinical trial is being conducted for early diagnosis of head and neck cancer, which is most prevalent in the Northern region.

“For early detection of cancer, we are also holding screenings of women from marginalised communities. We have a target to screen two lakh women from Varanasi for cervical cancer,” said Dr Chaturvedi.

Biggest public paediatric-oncology unit in North India

The Childhood Cancer Program in HBCH hospital provides children and families with care for which they would otherwise need to travel to Mumbai. Since its establishment in 2018, a total of 34,517 new registrations have been recorded. Outpatient unit sees 80-100 children each day with dozens receiving chemotherapy and other procedures. In 2021 there were almost 20,000 outpatient visits.

Dr Chaturvedi said that due to better health accessibility, the drop-out of paediatric patients is much lesser than what was earlier recorded at TMH. The 30-day mortality rate in 2021 after starting treatment was 6.5 per cent of new registrations.

“In cases like leukemia, where children take months for recovery, the dropout rate in Mumbai is higher among the patients from other states. But here, as the facilities are available at a close geographical proximity, we are able to save more lives,” said Dr Pradhan. Along with that the hospital has also started bone marrow transplant facilities — the first in Uttar Pradesh which has already benefited around 25 children.

Through dedicated trained social workers, they follow up and track back the paediatric patients for treatment. In June, the hospital also appointed a psychologist for counselling for the patient’s kin.