Kerala - Thiruvananthapuram   

A ray of hope for women

C. Maya

WITH A PIONEER: Governor R.L. Bhatia with Umberto Veronesi, scientific director, European Institute of Oncology, Milan, Italy, and Health Minister P.K. Sreemathy at the inauguration of the Trivandrum Breast Conference 2007 in the city on Friday.
51; Photo: S. Mahinsha

Thiruvananthapuram: At 81, Umberto Veronesi, the surgeon and scientist from Milan, Italy, still devotes the best part of his professional life allaying the fears of women with breast cancer. Thanks to Dr. Veronesi, who pioneered the concept of conservation surgery, women today can look forward to a life without disfigurement even after breast cancer.

"I have always believed that as a doctor, I should be able to give a good quality of life to women. It is not just enough to cure them of cancer; they need to live with self-confidence and a good body image," he says.

Dr. Veronesi, scientific director of the European Institute of Oncology and one of the founding fathers of breast cancer surgery in the world, was talking to The Hindu on the sidelines of the Trivandrum Breast Conference, organised by the Regional Cancer Centre, here on Friday.

Till the late Sixties, all women diagnosed with the disease had to undergo radical mastectomy - total removal of the breasts - so that the cancer did not recur. In 1981, at the end of a nine-year trial involving nearly 1,000 women patients selected at random, Dr. Veronesi declared that women with breast cancer need not necessarily undergo mastectomy.

There were many raised eyebrows when in 1981, The New York Times ran a 10-column story about Dr. Veronesi's findings. At a time when approximately one in eleven American women was being diagnosed with breast cancer, women took this up as a campaign. "I persuaded U.S. surgeon Bernard Fisher at the University of Pittsburgh to take up breast conservation surgeries. Four years later, his study was a confirmation of my conclusions," says Dr. Veronesi.

Today, through newer techniques such as Sentinel Node Biopsy and Intra-operative radiotherapy, doctors have been able to show women a whole new image of breast cancer, he points out.

Breast cancer patients need not undergo the trauma of prolonged treatment now. "In a single day, the tumour is removed, the sentinel biopsy done and when the patient is still sleeping on the operating table, we deliver one lifetime dose of radiation. We started this combination therapy in 1999 and have so far successfully treated over 2,500 cases," says Dr. Veronesi.

He heads the international team engaged in clinical trials on breast cancer prevention involving women who are at increased risk of cancer with two chemo prevention drugs, Tamoxifen and Fenretinide, a Vitamin A derivative.

Only five per cent of breast cancers are genetically conditioned and the rest is the work of environmental carcinogens. "Women who consume more fat and meat may be at increased risk of breast cancer. India has had a tradition of pure vegetarian diet but unfortunately, this tradition was not preserved and this may have a close link to the increasing incidence of breast cancer here," Dr. Veronesi says.

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