A cancer expert said fear is one of the common reasons for Filipinos why cancer patients only have their diagnosis at the late stages of the disease.
“Through my years, I’ve seen patients come to me very late on the stage and I think it’s really because of fear,” Dr. Conrado Gabriel Lorenzo, a senior medical oncologist at Healthway Cancer Care Hospital, said.
He added that the fear may also be born out of the second reason for late diagnosis, which is the lack of education on the matter.
“Patients should know that, often times, there’s something we can do if the tumor or the cancer is caught early,” he said.
He also included financial constraints as another big reason for the late diagnosis of Filipinos.
Lorenzo said these reasons go hand in hand since, in many cases, just getting to the diagnosis “can reach six figures, and you haven’t even started.”
Cancer patient Thasmira de Guzman said that when she got the news, a lot of thoughts filled her head but that all of them were out of fear.
“My reaction was I was so afraid. I’m afraid of losing my job, my house, everything that we built. It dawned on me that I might not be able to see my daughter grow, to love her in every stage of her life, and I feel na parang ayaw ko na magplano sa buhay. I stopped planning because I didn’t want to disappoint others and myself,” De Guzman said.
Echoing what De Guzman said, another patient recounted that the hardest part of their journey was not the “getting better” part but the early onset of the diagnosis.
“I think the hardest part of the journey was when you had to break the news to your children, to your family,” lung cancer patient Maricar Dizon said.
While fear might play a big role in the battle against cancer, another expert said the financial burden it puts on the patient is also another big hurdle.
“A million pesos is the minimum that many patients spend. There are variations to that because medications may vary, the type of surgery may vary,” Dr. Manuel Francisco Roxas, chief operating officer of Healthway Cancer Care Hospital, said.
However, a doctor also believes that battling cancer in the country as a whole should not stop at financial help but also in information drives.
“First is awareness and taking into the psyche of Filipinos that you need to have a good suspicion of what you feel, therefore empowering awareness and education to the public,” Dr. Jose Sollano Jr., medical director of Healthway Cancer Care Hospital, said.
“Today, cancer is not a death sentence anymore because there are cancers that we can detect early, and we can remove them,” Sollano added.
The most common causes of cancer in the Philippines are said to be genetics, pollution, diet, lifestyle, and late diagnosis, with over 180,000 recorded cases in 2022.
In 2024, cancer was ranked second among the leading causes of death in the Philippines, according to the Philippine Statistics Authority. (ABS-CBN News)