Johannesburg, South Africa (ADV) – The availability of medicine in Tanzania’s Ocean Road Cancer Institute (ORCI) has improved by 91 percent in the past three years.
The improvement has been credited to the government for increasing its budget allocation for procurement of drugs from 790 Million in 2015 to 7 Billion in June last year.
The institute’s Director of Planning Daudi Maneno revealed this to the Daily News, saying that this improvement has reduced patients’ complaints as they were now assured that their medication was available at the hospital.
“This has helped a lot to improve the situation at our institute, reducing patients’ complaints since they are guaranteed to obtain the medicines from the hospital,” said Maneno.
He further noted that the institute does only provide treatment, he said it also provides training which is aimed at increasing the number of cancer experts. This number has now increased to 25, from five cancer specialists in 2010.
“This is huge improvement… the institute does not only provide training to local specialists but also to foreign experts, we have so far trained 17 cancer experts from Kenya, Uganda, DR Congo, Comoro, Ethiopia and Nigeria, this has been possible through our collaboration with Muhimbili University of Health and Allied Sciences (MUHAS),” added Maneno.
ORCI Director of Cancer Prevention Services Dr Crispin Kahesa told added that said the institute has taken steps to improve services and that it was becoming the centre of excellence in East Africa.
“Our cooperation with other institutions and universities aims at enhancing capacity of our experts and establishing links that will help to sign deals that will allow our institutes to work together,” said Dr Kahesa.
ORCI is the only specialized facility for cancer treatment in Tanzania. It is located along the Indian Ocean. The facility is one of the oldest health institutions in Tanzania having been founded in 1895 by the German colonial government.
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