Philippine Charity Sweepstakes Office General Manager Alexander Balutan on Tuesday said 37,186 patients were recipients of benefits from the agency’s flagship project called Individual Medical Assistance Program (IMAP).
“This translates to P727.5 million of expenses for the month of May, based on the data provided to me by the Charity Assistance Department,” Balutan said in a statement.
“The P727.5 million is (a) 21.07 percent increase in spending and 26.14 percent increase in the beneficiaries compared with the same period last year,” he added.
According to Dr. Larry Cedro, assistant general manager for Charity Sector, the top three nature of requests included hospital confinement with 13,376 beneficiaries at P290.8 million; medicines with 12,132 beneficiaries at P149.9 million; and chemotherapy with 4,305 beneficiaries at P179.2 million.
“Compared with the same period last year, chemotherapy had the highest increase this month in terms of cases at 24.60 percent and amount spent at 30.35 percent; followed by request for medicines at 14.96 percent in cases and 15.63 percent in amount; and confinement at 15.71 percent in cases and 12.24 percent in amount,” Cedro said.
Balutan said close to P4 billion has been spent for the IMAP benefiting 190,000 of mostly poor patients.
Meanwhile, in a Globocan data prepared by the Philippine Cancer Society, there are estimated 11,000 new cancer cases in 2015.
Leading the new cancer cases from both sexes are breast, lung, colorectal, liver and cervical cancers.
In terms of new cancer deaths, the top is lung, liver and breast.
Breakthrough cancer treatments such as immunotherapy and targeted therapies could be seen as a new lease on life for patients suffering from cancer and they are increasingly becoming cancer treatment options.
Targeted therapy, as the name indicates, “target” specific cancer cells.
It alters the inner workings of the cell focusing on the part of the cancer cell that makes it different from the normal, healthy cell.
Immunotherapy, on the other hand, uses the body’s immune system to fight cancer cells.
It stimulates the immune system and may be used with other types of treatment or by itself.
While chemotherapy, as a general rule, targets the cells that are rapidly growing, however, it cannot differentiate between cancerous and healthy cells.
Cells such as those in gastrointestinal tract have fast-growing cells, and the side effect is they could get affected.