Cipla palliative care centre celebrates 25 years of ‘caring for life’

“The palliative doctor would then guide the patient through misconceptions on cancer, letting him/her know that they will be there for them helping them manage their pain. We want this for every single person and also provide home-based care once the patient is discharged,” she said.

The foundation was set up in 1997 at Warje, Pune to support patients and their families in their most difficult times. Since then, they have reached out to 18,500 patients (with cancer or other severe illnesses), providing care free of cost. The foundation aims to serves the purpose of ‘Caring for Life’ and, therefore, it was only natural for it to enter into palliative care.

Even as most patients have no access to palliative care for pain management, recently the Consortium of Palliative Care organisations, which includes Cipla, launched the Saath Saath national toll-free helpline 1800-202-7777.

“We have learnt a lot from our experiences and shared them with organisations across the country,” she said. “Due to the Covid pandemic, and now with the Omicron variant, a lot of cancer patients are at risk since they are immune-compromised. The Saath-Saath helpline, while it is not restricted to cancer patients, can be of immense help to them at any stage of cancer,” Hamied said, adding that so far they have received more than 400 calls.

According to estimates, the total number of people in India who need palliative care is likely to be 5.4 million a year. By offering pan-India coverage in multiple languages, this service is aimed at ensuring that no person with a serious illness feels alone and has access to options such as pain relief, physiotherapy, diet advice and family counselling to assist them and caregivers with the help of qualified healthcare professionals and trained volunteers.

Meanwhile in March 2021, in partnership with King George V Memorial Trust, Cipla Palliative Care set up Mumbai’s first inclusive supportive care centre, ‘Sukoon Nilaya’, a 16-bedded palliative care facility that offers free-of-cost out-patient services and in-patient admissions to adult patients with cancer, as well as to patients with chronic renal, cardiac, respiratory and neurological conditions. The large unmet demand for palliative care cannot be served by palliative care experts alone. At CPC, training programmes are evidence-based and rooted in practice to enable healthcare providers to include palliative care in their practice, Cipla authorities said. These include Integrated Module of Palliative Care in Cancer Treatment (IMPACT) in association with the SAARC Federation of Oncologists and Certificate in Essentials of Palliative Care course designed by Indian Association of Palliative Care and others.