The Uganda Cancer Institute (UCI) has honored two experts in cancer treatment for winning the International Award of Excellence in cancer care in South Korea. The awards were given by the Lee Jong-Wook Fellowship which is run by Yonsei University.
Dr. Martin Origa a Gynecologist Oncologist and Dr. Solomon Owino a biomedical engineer were shortlisted by the UCI to go to South Korea under the support of the Korean Foundation for International Health to acquire skills in different aspects of cancer care.
Through this partnership, the UCI has over 4O doctors trained in South Korea in a bid to improve the management the treatment of cancer patients in the country.
Dr. Owino said that while in South Korea he completed with 12 participants from seven countries which include Ghana, Tanzania, Ethiopian Mongolia, and Cambodian among others.
Owino developed a contactless temperature monitoring and measurement system that can be used for long-term monitoring of the disease progression and therapy response.
Dr. Origa won the award after designing an application on mobile phones that educates women about cervical cancer and screening. Through the app, women will also be directed to where to get services.
He said that all the activities are aimed at increasing knowledge about cervical cancer which is one of Uganda’s health burdens.
Jackson Orem the Executive Director of UCI highlighted that they are looking for collaboration in different fields so that they can build capacity locally.
Dr. Nixon Niyonzima the head of research and training at UCI revealed that because of the high numbers of patients seeking cancer care at UCI, there is a need to have highly qualified personnel.
“We have more types of equipment we need more engineers as a department Currently we have three biomedical engineers and all these need to be trained and equipped and also we need five more biomedical engineers”. Dr. Niyonzima stated.
He also said that they are yet to recruit more engineers and are still looking for partnerships so that the institute can send all the biomedical engineers for training.
Dr. Niyonzima added that there is a need for more specialists for cervical cancers to curb the burden which is the most common cancer in Uganda.
He said that UCI has now started a training program in Gynecological oncology to increase the number of personnel who are highly qualified like Dr. Origa.
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