With cancer, diabetes, heart conditions and other chronic diseases on the rise in the Caribbean, the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) recently launched a four-year project to improve radiation medicine capabilities across the region’s 32 island countries.
IAEA convened a coordination meeting in Vienna last week that brought together representative from the Caribbean, the Pan-American Health Organization (PAHO), the International Organization for Medical Physics (IOMP), the Latin-American Association of Medical Physics (ALFIM), the American Association of Physicists in Medicine (AAPM), and the United Nations Scientific Committee on the Effects of Atomic Radiation (UNSCEAR).
“The aim is to strengthen radiation medicine in the region, particularly in countries that have only recently become members of the IAEA,” Dazhu Yang, IAEA deputy director General and Head of the Department of Technical Cooperation, said. “The goal is to improve skills through training, with the ultimate objective of ensuring safe and effective diagnosis and treatment of patients.”
Most Caribbean countries provide radiation diagnostic services, but limited training opportunities, dispersed populations across the island regions, poor infrastructure, and risk of natural disasters have been barriers to the widespread adoption of radiation medicine.
“The health profile of the Caribbean has shifted, and non-communicable diseases are the greatest problem now,” Godfrey Xuereb, PAHO representative for Barbados and the Eastern Caribbean countries, said. “Breast, cervical and prostate cancers are the leading causes of death in males and females.”
Saint Vincent and the Grenadines have approximately 110,000 residents spread across 32 islands. The islands joined IAEA last year to expand access to radiation medicine there by sharing resources with neighboring countries.
“Now we only offer diagnostic and limited chemotherapy services,” Simone Beache, the country’s chief medical officer, said. “But we lose a number of cases, even if we catch them early, because of limited access to radiotherapy.”