Since 2019 the American Eurasian Cancer Alliance (AECA) and the Worldwide Hospice Palliative Care Alliance (WHPCA), have established a partnership that has resulted in increased access to palliative care throughout the Eurasian region and have garnered considerable good will globally.
- Over 60 million people need palliative care annually including over a million women with gynecological cancers over 80% of whom live in low- and middle-income countries. Only about 4% of this need is being met.
- Cervical cancer has the highest burden of serious health-related suffering of all forms of cancer with moderate to severe pain at close to 90%.
- Since 2019 WHPCA and AECA have been working together in Eastern Europe and Central Asia to help build cancer services, especially for women with advanced GYN cancers. We have successfully increased the education of health professionals throughout the region and are on the verge of making major strides in closing this ‘access abyss.’
- In our partnership with the International Gynecological Cancer Society we recently published an ICGS Declaration on Palliative and Supportive Care: Relieving Serious Health-Related Suffering for Women with Gynecologic Cancers calling for the integration of palliative care into all GYN oncology practices worldwide. President’s Message: IGCS Declaration on Palliative & Supportive Care in Gynecologic Oncology – ehospice
- AECA and WHPCA have been supporting the development of palliative care in the Eurasian Region through provision of educational programmes and quarterly case conferences. This has resulted in bi-lateral learning as key US palliative care specialists from leading US Universities (Harvard, Johns Hopkins, Indiana University and Fox Chase Cancer Center) are tangibly involved in an ongoing learning collaborative with colleagues throughout the Eurasia region who are improving the delivery of palliative care to people in low and middle-income countries where the need for palliative care is greatest resulting in improvement for palliative care delivery in the US.
- Recent work by AECA with WHPCA includes work to develop palliative care services for cancer in Uzbekistan and Ukraine. The government of Uzbekistan, in cooperation with WHO, is building palliative care as an essential component of oncology services as this country engages more with the West and they want our expertise in doing so. In Ukraine the war has resulted in an increased need for palliative care for those seriously injured and dying. Working with our in-country partners there is also opportunity for support from the US that strengthens their ties to the West.
Without AECA none of these accomplishments would have been possible. Work will continue and there is hope for funding to expand this line of work.
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