450 children benefit from Le Memorial's cancer, blood disorder camp

Over the weekend, Le Memorial Medical Services held a two-day paediatric camp aimed at creating awareness about cancers in children and blood disorders, especially sickle cell disease.

In total, over 450 children from all over Uganda were seen by a team of specialised doctors in Haematology and Oncology, physicians and medical officers.

Of this, over 80% of the children were living with sickle cell disease.

Many parents did not know how their children acquired sickle cell disease, and they received comprehensive health education talks from specialists haematologists and from mothers to sickle cell disease warriors who shared their own experiences with other mothers and gave them courage and hope for the future of this children.

Mityana Woman MP, Joyce Bagala was one of the mothers who shared her experience of looking after a child with sickle cells.

Over 1,500 laboratory tests including sickle cell disease screening, malaria tests, and complete blood count were performed on all eligible patients as prescribed by the doctors.

In addition, over 20 oral medicines and syrups, totalling to over 10,000 doses were dispensed. All these were free of charge. About 15 patients required short-term admissions for resuscitation, with intravenous fluids, injectable painkillers, and five required urgent blood transfusions.

This camp is the first of its kind and adds to the existing services such as maternity, antenatal care, intensive care unit, and general medical services at Le Memorial which is located in Lubowa, 2.5 km off Entebbe Road.