Cytecare Cancer Hospitals: Fighting Cancer the Right Way
A cancer diagnosis can have a severe emotional, social and financial impact on a patient’s life. Finding the right hospital that provides a comprehensive approach towards cancer prevention and treatment is crucial to battle this disease, which is not easy for patients. At Cytecare Cancer Hospitals, we believe in delivering Comprehensive Cancer Care through four fundamental care principles. We believe that these principles enable and empower us to care for our patients in the right way.
The Four Core Principles Include:
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Organ-Site Focus:
Cytecare is a forerunner in organ-site focus. The rationale of organ-focus originates from the fact that the physiology of each organ is specialized and different. Oncologists specialized in an organ-site specific area (example: Breast, Head & Neck, Gastrointestinal, Hepatobiliary, Reproductive, etc) have dedicated several years into understanding the disease physiology specific to an organ and will be able to provide superior treatment advice and latest clinical information that is specific to the organ-site of the disease, unlike a generic approach.
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Standardized Global Care Guidelines:
Cytecare team of specialists are focused on achieving the best clinical outcomes and always ensure that therapeutic decisions and choices are based on scientifically proven, evidence-based protocols.
We diligently incorporate best practices and set our standards of treatment based on the recommendations and guidelines set by globally recognized bodies such as the National Comprehensive Cancer Network (NCCN), European Society for Medical Oncology (ESMO), National Health Service (NHS), Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR) and Tata Memorial Hospital. These guidelines standardize care pathways for patients and offer a number of programs to give clinicians access to tools and knowledge that can help guide decision-making in the management of cancer.
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Multidisciplinary Approach and Tumour Board:
At Cytecare, we offer a multi-disciplinary approach to cancer care. Our surgeons, medical oncologists, radiation oncologist and other specialists form the Tumour Board and work in consensus to provide the best treatment plan. Also, treating cancer patients means treating cancer as well as the co-existing non-cancer issues. It is well understood that for a better outcome, effective treatment of both cancer and non-cancer issues in a cancer patient is vital.
Our cancer specialists maintain diligence in addressing a patient’s comorbidities and other ‘non-cancer’ issues and are responsive to our patient’s holistic well-being and individual needs and values. Despite expert opinions of the tumour board, Cytecare believes the patient should be the key decision-maker in treatment choice and disease management. Hence, our oncologists spend a significant amount of time to engage the patient and their caregivers in treatment decision making, sharing clinical information, encouraging them to express concerns and understanding the physician’s instructions. We believe that involving patients will help them be more open to various treatment options and complete the therapy. Also, an informed patient is able to fully understand and deliberate the risks versus benefits trade-offs in a particular treatment and are often more satisfied with the clinical decisions. We believe that an involved patient will have a better psychological outcome.
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Patient-Centric Cancer Care:
It is known that no two cancers are the same and hence a one size fits all approach does not apply to cancer treatment. At Cytecare, we strive to provide patient-centric care, by understanding patient’s medical history, type of tumour or cancer diagnosed, location, stage of cancer, the tumour biology and integrating this information with the latest clinical knowledge, state of the art technology, evidence-based protocols and latest research information with the aim to provide effective treatment, better outcome and prognosis to each patient. When a patient is diagnosed with cancer, often they are left to make life-changing decisions, without prior experience or knowledge to guide them. Sometimes, the patient may receive too little, too much, or conflicting information from various sources. Patients are left with a self-exploring, steep learning curve. Cytecare invests heavily on patient education throughout their disease trajectory. We provide patient education related to their diagnosis, treatment, side effects, psychological support through our counseling clinic, coach them on diet, nutritional need during and post-treatment. Our clinical educators, counsellors and oncologists all aim towards reducing the patient’s stress and anxiety, thereby enabling them to understand their disease and its treatment. To summarize, Cytecare’s cancer care approach places the individual in the centre and designs a treatment plan around the individual’s diagnosis.
As the incidence of cancer is slowly increasing in India, there is a growing need for a unique approach, which enables us to understand cancer better and helps provide access to advanced, expert and personalized care. This is only possible when we treat each case as unique and not as a mere statistic. At Cytecare, each patient is important and providing the best treatment is our personal goal. We acknowledge that our clinical team learns and understands the various challenges and facets of the disease on a day to day basis, through our patients. Their stories inspire us and give us the strength to help them battle this disease together.
