AFG: Projects: Children: Sick
Children's Department, National Cancer Center
Personal Observations from the Executive Director: In September 2001, AFG Advisory Board Member Dr. Hugh Robertson and I were invited by Dr. Levan Bakanidze to visit the Children’s Department of the National Cancer Center. Earlier that year, U.S. Air Force Captain Ben Ungerman, who was stationed in Georgia, wanted to help and raised money to renovate the common room in the Children’s Department. Dr. Bakanidze asked AFG to continue the work begun by Captain Ungerman. Dr. Robertson and I saw the inviting common room with newly purchased television, VCR, comfortable furniture and cartoon characters painted on the walls. In contrast, the rest of the Children’s Department was appalling. The hallways, bedrooms and dining room were dark and dingy. The bathrooms were unusable. Parents had to bring their children home to bathe them.
Dr. Bakanidze told me that he felt it was difficult enough for these kids to have cancer but it was an outright shame that the facility for them was in such disrepair. I was moved by his concern for the children especially because he is not a pediatric specialist. He is a neck and head oncologist who works in another wing of the hospital.
AFG Accomplishments: In May 2003, Lena Kiladze and I were taken by Dr. Bakanidze to visit the newly renovated Children’s Department of the National Cancer Center. The renovation was made possible by AFG funding. That same day the former Georgian Minister of Health was also shown the new wing and was so impressed that he asked us how we did it. We have:
- Renovated the bathrooms with new plumbing and fixtures so that children no longer need to be taken home to be bathed
- Installed new electricity in the hallways
- Laid a new floor in the hallways
- Painted the walls of the bedrooms, dining room and hallways
- Given a grant to the National Cancer Center for membership in the International Union Against Cancer, which allows hospital staff global access to current information on anti-cancer treatments, literature, conferences, fellowships and grants.
- Funded travel expenses so that Dr. Bakanidze could confer with the Vienna University clinic which is helping Georgia to implement Radioactive Iodine Therapy for thyroid cancer patients (Thyroid cancer has increased dramatically in Georgia over the past ten years—it is thought because Georgia is in fourth place among countries damaged by the Chernobyl catastrophe)
- Shipped four computers donated by the United Nations and supplies from Cape Cod Hospital
- Sent two refurbished general anesthesia machines
Current Needs: The Children’s Department of the National Cancer Center is struggling to find ways to bring cancer treatment in Georgia in line with that of the West. The Children’s Department needs:
- Renovation of the dressing room where mini-surgical procedures take place along with follow up wound care for the children
- Renovation of specialized care room where children receive examinations and chemotherapy
- Used gamma camera to help launch new radiotechnology in Georgia for the treatment of cancer
- Radiotherapy is one of the main methods of pediatric oncology treatment at the National Cancer Center (The Center has been offered a grant of $1.3 million from the International Atomic Energy Agency to provide updated needed equipment for radiotherapy but the grant is contingent on the Center asking significant renovations to the rooms where the equipment will be installed