Volunteer surgeons are helping 30 women battling breast cancer with surgeries to help them overcome the disease.
Cape Town, South Africa (08 July 2024) – Surgical backlogs are one of the most frustrating parts of our current medical system, but there are teams that work to relieve this by hosting charity days. Project Flamingo is one of those, helping reduce the waiting list for surgeries related to breast cancer. This year, the team hopes to break a record by doing 30 surgeries in one day across five hospitals and two provinces!
Dr Liana Roodt went viral in 2017 after news broke that she was the driving force behind Project Flamingo and doing catch-up surgeries for women with breast cancer. When we shared the original article in 2017, we never dreamed of how far Dr Roodt and her team would go to make a difference for South African women.
Dr Liana Roodt makes a huge difference in the public health sector for women battling breast cancer. She started her programme, ‘Project Flamingo,’ at Groote Schuur Hospital, which is today adopted throughout South Africa.
This coming Mandela Day, Dr Roodt and a team of incredible surgeons and medical support staff will be doing 30 surgeries in one day to help alleviate the backlog of surgeries.
The ambitious project is set to take place across two provinces, on Saturday, the 13th of July 2024, ahead of Mandela Day.
“Utilizing five teams at five public hospitals across two provinces, they aim to address the urgent need for timely cancer care in the Public Health sector and to bring hope to patients in need.”
The five hospitals include Groote Schuur, Tygerberg, George, Cecilia Makiwane in East London, and Livingstone in Gqeberha.
Since its founding 14 years ago, Project Flamingo has done 1518 surgeries. Project Flamingo is rooted in the belief that breast cancer care is a basic human right. South Africa’s Public Health system cannot manage the patient load, which means that many patients are caught in unacceptably long waiting periods for adequate breast cancer treatment. Surviving breast cancer has a widespread effect on the households and communities in which these women are often the breadwinners, mothers, and primary caregivers.
As the most common cancer in the world (surpassing lung cancer) and the most diagnosed cancer among women in South Africa, 1 in 8 women is at risk of being diagnosed globally in their lifetime, according to the World Health Organization’s latest statistics. It is documented that over 9000 new cases are diagnosed annually in South Africa. And despite its prevalence, well over 50% of patients in the Public Health sector present with late-stage disease. This reality combined with long waiting periods and a lack of infrastructure to cope with patient load nationally, significantly curbs the impact of efforts to provide equitable care. Resulting in unnecessary loss of life.
Project Flamingo has for the past 14 years met this challenge head-on with catch-up surgeries, compassionate patient support, and advocacy programs, and is doing so again.
If you would like to support this cause, you can do so via the website here.
Sources: Project Flamingo
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