Surgery access in tropical areas and Updates in Oncology

     More than 5 billion people in the world do not have full access to safe, affordable and timely surgical care, especially in lower-middle-income countries (Lancet Global Health, 2015). In sub-Saharan Africa, there is only one operating room per 100,000 inhabitants. Not many operating rooms have enough capacity to provide safe surgical care. For instance, 5% of the population of developed countries such as Australia, North America and Western Europe do not have full surgical access. A recent report from World Health Organization (WHO) showed that more than 90% of deaths from injuries occur in low- and middle-income countries. Despite such a surgical imbalance around the world, surgery is still “the neglected stepchild of global health”. No global funding organization focuses specifically on the provision of surgical care, and none of the major donors are willing to support and acknowledge surgery as an imperative part of global public health. In Vietnam, there are increasingly achievement and development in medicine in general and in surgery in particular, reaching the better outcome as in developed countries. The government, ministry of health and doctors have been trying their best to perform complex procedures such as transplantation and robot assisted surgery. Besides, the citizens have opportunities to be cured by specialists. Nonetheless, there are not any studies on surgery access conducted in Vietnam.

     There are more than 14 million people in the world suffer annually from cancer and more than 8 million deaths of this disease. It is predicted that there will be approximately 30 million new cancer patients which cause 20 million deaths in which two third are in developing countries. In Vietnam, there are around 170000 to 180000 new cases of cancer each year leading to 80000 to 90000 deaths. In Hai Phong city, the quantity of new cancer patients is estimated around 4000 to 5000, nevertheless, only 60% to 70% of them were treated in hospital. It is considered that cancer nowadays is a global issue of human health. The questions have been instigated are prevention, early diagnosis, treatment of cancer and limitation of burden due to this severe disease. Surgical treatment is considered a curative therapy for most of early stage cancers until now. However, there are still challenges for cancer patients in access to surgery due to delayed diagnosis.

     As the reasons mentioned above, the Hai Phong University of Medicine and Pharmacy together in collaboration with the French Academie Nationale de Médecine and the French Société de Pathologie Exotique organize the international conference on “Surgery Access in tropical areas and Updates in Oncology” in Hai Phong city (Vietnam) from 8th to 10th November 2017. This is an occasion for researchers, health managers, surgeons and oncologist to have opportunities to discuss on public aspect of surgery and to updates advances in oncology.