World Cancer Day: sister tells of grief over losing brother to cancer in pandemic

A resident told of her grief over losing her brother to pancreatic cancer last month. Paromita Srinivasan said her brother, Biswajit, had the disease diagnosed at the end of 2019 and faced many challenges along the way, in part because of the Covid-19 pandemic. She shared her brother’s struggles on World Cancer Day in the hope that his story would help others. “I think the first bit of disbelief was that it was quite a final diagnosis, and we had to get our head around that,” said Ms Srinivasan, who runs a communication consultancy. “We all did a lot of research, around not just what the disease was, but how we could deal with it. Mentally, we had the sword of Damocles hanging over our heads. Strangely, there is a lot of support for breast cancer sufferers, but not so much for other types of cancers.” Mr Biswajit was 60 years old when he died from cancer, and was survived by his wife. The World Cancer Research Fund reported that pancreatic cancer is the 12th most commonly occurring cancer in men, and 11th most frequent in women. A study by The Lancet showed the number of cancer cases and deaths caused by the disease more than doubled from 1990 to 2017. According to oncologists at Cleveland Clinic in Abu Dhabi, the average cost of one cycle of chemotherapy [between six to eight sessions] in the UAE ranges from Dh300,000 to Dh400,000 – depending on the type of cancer. Mr Biswajit faced financial challenges during his cancer battle, in part because of the limits imposed by his medical insurance company in Dubai. This led him to undergo the initial phase of his chemotherapy treatment in his home country, India. However, the Covid-19 pandemic brought new challenges. “The plan was that he would do one cycle, recuperate in Dubai and then go back for another. Then, Covid-19 struck. He was stuck in India and treatments were suspended in the initial stages of the pandemic, and later restarted. Then he had to explore returning to Dubai for a bit – for visa and other reasons,” Ms Srinivasan said. “We went from pillar to post here to find a reasonable solution that our insurance would co-pay, and also explored charitable options. “In the end, it was Tawam Hospital that took care of his needs and subsidised the treatments. Their healthcare was truly ‘patient first’." Several other cancer patients living in the UAE faced heartbreaking challenges because of the pandemic. Ana Antill described how her daughter, Amelia, 3, was stranded in South Africa with her father for four months. On July 29, after returning to Dubai, she was diagnosed with acute lymphoblastic leukemia. “We felt swollen lymph nodes under her chin, so we went to the hospital where her haemoglobin was three. That is life threatening, so she was immediately given a blood transfusion, and we started her treatment one week later,” Ms Antill said. Amelia has now been through 26 weeks of arduous treatment. "It gave her high blood pressure, she stopped walking, and she was extremely nauseated. She suffered acute gastritis – which got us admitted to hospital for a whole month – and pneumonia. “We are lucky that Amelia is young and she will not remember the pain in the future, but we will. There’s nothing worse than seeing your child suffer and not be able to do anything to make them feel better." Ms Antill’s husband is a pilot but has been unemployed for a year, meaning she had to juggle work and time spent in hospital with her daughter. Amelia also had to change hospitals because their initial healthcare facility was designated as a Covid-19 centre. “We learnt to be grateful for the little things, and we are looking forward to ring the bell in 19 months time, after we finish her maintenance chemotherapy,” Ms Antill said.

World Cancer Day: sister tells of grief over losing brother to cancer in pandemic

Paromita Srinivasan's brother Biswajit died of pancreatic cancer last month at age 60