Thousands of women in Ghana are diagnosed with breast and cervical cancer every year, but without early treatment or enough medical supplies, physicians struggle to help them overcome the disease.
Nadia Miniclier, a professor of family and preventative medicine, initiated the physician assistant program that sent personnel to Ghana to provide medical information to assitants last summer. She said she feels they need more help and has organized the next phase in the Women’s Health Initiative at the U.
“The health initiative just popped into our heads,” Miniclier said. “We will be training 25 medical assistants and midwives in Ghana. We will also screen about 1,500 to 2,000 women for cervical cancer and breast cancer, as well as be treating them.”
Miniclier proposed the training of how to screen for certain types of cancer to the Ghanaian Ministry of Health and she said they were very excited with the idea.
Besides screening for types of cancer, U medical personnel will train physician assistants in Ghana about other types of preventive care not limited to women.
The U invited a four-member delegation from Ghana to meet with physicians and students at the U, as well as state officials, to discuss the initiative.
“This is just the beginning,” said Gladys Ashitey, deputy minister of health for Ghana. “Our hope is to set this up for the whole nation.”
Miniclier said the initiative is crucial because there are about 500 medical personnel who are the primary caregivers for Ghana’s 22 million citizens.
Although doctors in Ghana are trained to look for early warning signs of cervical and breast cancer, physician assistants do not have enough time to learn. The program will give assistants the expertise they need to help men, women and children in rural communities in Ghana.
“Plans are on the way to scale up the numbers of people trained,” said E. T. Adjase, a doctor and director of the Rural Health Training School in Ghana. “(We hope) to have 200 more assistants trained by 2010.”
U medical personnel will be sent to Ghana in June 2009 to begin screening. They are still in the process of securing funds to pay for screening, medical equipment and travel costs.
“We’re working on some grants right now,” Miniclier said.
The initiative includes plans to help the Ghanaian Ministry of Health establish funds to continue testing for different types of cancer.
“Our ultimate hope is that within three or four years, midwives and physician assistants will be trained and they’ll be able to train others,” Miniclier said.