Using Artificial Intelligence(AI) for medical mapping has translated into the West Bengal health department developing an app for identifying cases on ground.
The Institute of Post Graduate Medical Education&Research(IPGMER), which operates a specialised breast cancer clinic and works with state-level initiatives to improve cancer treatment, has received funds from the state Health and Family Welfare Department to develop the app with the help of an IT firm. The app is expected to be launched soon.
How it works:
The initial premise of the app will be data collected by Accredited Social Health Activists(ASHA) at the ground level. ASHA workers who are chosen from the community in local areas act as a bridge between the public health system and people in their community. They ask women three questions based on which data is collected and teach them through talks and videos on how to identify anomalies during self-examination. ASHA workers will go back again after about thirty days to collect data and detect breast cancer patients. The data will be accessible on a real-time basis and, based on ultrasound reports, will be categorised as high or low-risk patients.
Oncologist Dr Diptendra Sarkar, who is instrumental in working with the state Health and Family Welfare department to develop the app, said, “It is important that we have a decentralisation of healthcare. We don’t want patients to come to bigger hospitals in the city and bear huge out-of-pocket expenses. Instead, this app focuses on ASHA workers going door to door mapping breast cancer cases and we create an ecosystem for them to visit local hospitals to begin the first line of treatment.”
There is also a separate app for the state government, for ASHA workers to upload the names, addresses, locations and ID numbers for suspected breast cancer patients.
“There is a gap between knowing about breast cancer and getting treatment in rural areas. Our support group workers, who are termed as DISHA, have found in a survey that 84 per cent of rural people know about breast cancer," he added.
This is part of the ‘Pink Corridor’ initiative launched in the state in 2024, which aims at breast cancer awareness and treatment by empowering local hospitals through telemedicine as an attempt to include more rural areas. A year ago, the ‘Pink Corridor’ initiative was introduced and showcased in August this year as the ‘Bengal Model’ at the Association of Breast Surgeons of India(ABSICON), for treating such cases.
Breast cancer awareness
October is known as Breast Cancer Awareness Month or the ‘pink month’ where regular check-ups, workshops and camps are encouraged to educate women to address these health concerns. Community outreach programmes are conducted in rural areas.
The government of India has an early breast cancer detection programme, which is under the national non-communicable disease programme, in which 3 cancers are covered: oral, cervical and breast cancer.
Indian Cancer Society(ICS), an NGO that has about eighty cancer outreach programmes every year, has an app too, called ‘Rise Against Cancer’, to educate people. For example, if a woman has a lump on her breast, what should she do? The app, which is primarily in English, can answer questions in Bengali, Marathi, Bengali and Hindi. Helpline numbers are also provided.
The risk of developing breast cancer is 1 in 28 women, who will develop breast cancer if they don’t die of any other disease, keeping an average age of 74 years. About 1,50,000 women are at lifetime risk of developing breast cancer, 13,000 new cases every year in West Bengal, between 45-70 years of age. “More than 30 per cent of all cancer cases are breast cancer in West Bengal, with an approximate 44,000 new cancer cases every year, of which 40,000 are breast cancer cases. We are seeing younger age groups of women developing breast cancer because of lifestyle changes, late marriage, and late childbirth.” Said Dr.Arunabha Sengupta, Surgical oncologist, secretary of the India Cancer Society.
Dr Sengupta also points out that breast cancer cases are increasing among women in India and West Bengal, except in rural areas like Purulia and East Midnapore district. Earlier, a larger number of uterine and cervical cancers were reported. Lifestyle changes and urbanisation have led to breast cancer surpassing uterine and cervical cancer and hence there is more focus now on breast awareness and assisting women in rural and urban areas with treatment.
Earlier, lung cancer topped the list and now breast cancer has become the common cancer globally. WHO has set a breast cancer initiative which targets such cases being identified from when a lump is discovered and initiates the first line of treatment within 60 days after which the stage goes up.
