day conference attended by 500 doctors from the Kingdom and abroad entitled “Oncology Updated 2012” concluded at the Intercontinental Hotel here,Thursday. The conference, organized by the International Medical Center (IMC), Jeddah, and aimed at providing the latest treatments and methods in fighting cancer, began with a question and answer session between specialists and attendees who included local doctors and interested members of the public. Dr. Walid Fitaihi, CEO and chairman of the IMC's board of directors and Prof. Ezzeldin Ibrahim, senior consultant at IMC, director of the Oncology Center of Excellence and executive director of IMC's Research Centre, hosted the conference. “The idea for the conference emerged from the center's vision of comprehensive healthcare for healing a patient's mind, body and soul with world-class standards,” Dr. Fitaihi said. “Exchanging knowledge, experience and building research bridges between local and international centers in Europe, America and Canada were the key motives behind the conference.” Prof. Ibrahim said that the objective of the conference was to raise awareness among cancer patients of the different aspects of the disease. Apart from oncologists, the conference updated surgeons, radiotherapists, doctors and pathologists who test various specimens. The conference differed from earlier programs in the sense that it included workshops dedicated to highlighting the center's vision of assuring full recovery and the importance of establishing a healthy and positive relationship with cancer patients. Dr. Essam Murshid, head of the Saudi Oncology Society who chaired the conference, hailed the center for its sense of social and educational responsibility. “I am delighted to be part of such a conference mainly because of its objective and its way of allowing people in the medical field to meet the specialists whose books they have studied,” he said. The conference featured an open discussion with some of the main speakers, giving the public an opportunity to share their concerns with the best physicians and researchers in the world of oncology. The idea behind IMC's stress on having discussions with the public in such matters is a form of awareness, prevention and the updating of those who have suffered from any form of cancer as part of the center's sense of social responsibility, said Prof. Ibrahim. The audience's questions triggered discussions, such as when a cancer survivor asked about getting rid of the side effects of chemotherapy. There was also good news for patients suffering from pancreatic cancer when it was revealed that the survival rate had gone up to 30 percent from a previous 10-15 percent thanks to new surgical technology. Dr. Charles Butts from the Cross Cancer Institute in Alberta, Canada stressed the importance of a patient's psychological state and the need for physicians to be aware of that as well as the nursing staff and the patient's family in efforts to achieve the best results. __
