Along with the above mentioned radiotherapy equipment; the Hospital is also receiving new additional devices mainly Catalyst and Clarity which increase precision in tumor targeting and protection of healthy cells for patients. For example, the Catalyst helps in accurately and precisely defining the location of the tumor during planning and treatment stages. Clarity will make allowance for the potential internal movement of some organs while the patient is  receiving the radiotherapy.

VIENNA, Austria, 22nd July, 2015 (WAM) — The OPEC Fund for International Development, OFID, has announced that the Children’s Cancer Hospital Egypt, CCHE, widely known as Hospital 57357, has been selected to receive the OFID 2015 Annual Award for Development.

The hospital was selected in recognition of its work in alleviating the suffering of children and its dedication in fighting cancer and achieving adequate treatment facilities. The Award, which comes with a US$100,000 prize, was announced on the sidelines of the 36th session of the Ministerial Council.

The Award was presented by the Council Chairman, the Chairman of the Governing Board and the Director-General. The Ambassador of Egypt to Austria, Khaled Shamaa, received the Award on behalf of the 57357 Group.

Alnahar website: http://al-nahar.tv/elnahar/tvs/show/program/50/1561

Emiratis  news agency : https://www.wam.ae/en/news/international/1395283565233.html

Please press the link to watch the  video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gBM7za02BNE&feature=youtu.be

We have so much to celebrate for:  8 years of operation, the launch of the  new 60bed extension at the  Hospital premises and  Tanta branch in the Delta, the newly recorded average  over-all survival rate of 74.7% at the hospital, the completion of the architectural schematic design for its future  Health Sciences Campus and the successful take-off of the joint 57357/Dana Farber Boston Children’s pediatric oncology fellowship program

Most of all, we are celebrating you, our supporters and charitable partners. To you goes the credit for all our accomplishments.

57357’s children will be able to enjoy the Eid like all other children…. because they are no more afraid of cancer. They feel they are constantly protected by the Almighty. At 57357, they feel like being at Home among friends and family. There, they all know they are receiving the best comprehensive care.

57357’s Children are waiting impatiently for the Eid. They dream of a beautiful toy, a new outfit, but they also dream of Cure

Do not forget our children at 57357, Pray for them, Come and visit them, Celebrate the Eid with them!

Have a blessed and Happy Eid! 

Because our children’s well-being is what we value the most

During this month  we celebrated 8 years of operations for Hospital 57357

Instead of celebrating with words and slogans, this year we will commemorate all what has been accomplished so far…. The promises we made and the promises we kept…..thanks to the support and generosity of all of you who believe in the worthiness of our mission.

 Eight years ago, on July 7^th, 2007, the Hospital opened its doors to the public to provide the best quality comprehensive care to all children with cancer free of charge without discrimination. Since then we were committed to a number of goals and promises we pledged to realize. During our 5^th anniversary, we announced the recording of an average over-all survival rate of 70%, promising to raising it to reach the developed world rates.  Back then, we also revealed our commitment to a number of important capacity and program expansion projects, including the setting up of world accredited training and education programs to breed a new generation of healthcare professionals capable of ushering in a new era for healthcare in Egypt

 Today, after 8 years of operation, we affirm that the promises we made were promises we kept. Just recently, the Hospital announced the new record of 74.7% average over-all survival rate, almost 3% up from last year. This year, we celebrated the launching of the Ola Ghabbour 60 bed extension within our premises and the opening of the 60 bed Tanta branch to reach out to our sick children in the Delta and ease the commuting burden on their families. We also celebrated the launching of a pediatric oncology fellowship training program in collaboration with Dana Farber Boston Children’s Cancer Center to create a pool of highly qualified pediatric oncology physicians.

Presently we are running ahead of time to execute a number of important expansion projects including a 300 bed in-patient tower, a health Sciences Training Academy, an advanced research institute and a guest house for our patients’ families.

Still our most important achievement remains to be the change we introduced in society’s perception of free of charge healthcare and of cancer disease. Free care is no more synonymous of poor quality care. Cancer is no more a deadly disease. Cancer can be defeated and increasing cure rates of our patients at 57357 are the best example for that. Our little heroes are overcoming cancer with courage, faith, and confidence that at 57357 they are receiving the best of care and are maximizing their chances of cure.

57357 is truly the place where their families do not worry about the cost of treatment. Every single service offered is free of charge.

57357 is the place where all services provided are on par with those offered at the best hospitals worldwide.

This is a place where the patient feels at home and where physicians and nurses are his friends and family.

A place that does not stop at present achievements but is determined to constantly pursue excellence through continuous education and training and collaborations with the top cancer centers and universities in the world

A place that is not only concerned with treatment but also with prevention and awareness

A place that is supported by charitable generous people and by devoted employees who are doing their utmost without expecting any returns.

 Today as we celebrate our 8^th anniversary, we affirm that we are grateful first to God almighty and second to your support for all what has been accomplished so far.  It is because of your support and your belief in the worthiness of our cause and the right of our children to access the best quality care, that we are able to continue the journey…

I had the chance to chat with members of the 57357delegation who attended the 2015 Cerner Achievement & Innovation Awards early June in Dubai. Members of the delegation included Haytham Allam, medical applications Manager, IT, Research Nurse Wessam Ahmed, , and Dr. Walid Magdi Hassan, research department. Each one presented his work at the sixth annual Cerner Middle East Regional User Group Meeting, a two-day, knowledge-sharing event to which  Cerner Middle East clents’ health care leaders, clinicians and IT professionals are exclusively invited. The event is a good exposure to best practices and  latest developments in regional health care.  During the event Cerner acknowledges clients that present quality solutions and the best health care IT system applications or projects from the previous 12 months at an awarding ceremony

“57357 was recognized for being the fastest with the least number of clicks to place patients’ orders to the Cerner system worldwide.” reveals to me Mr. Allam, who further explains that this is reflecting the ease with which users of the Cerner system are operating and the benefits for the patients in terms of shorter waiting time. Mr. Allam presented the IT department’s contributions to the integration of all Hospital data computing systems with the Cerner Informatics system within a big data warehouse. In doing so, the IT department is pursuing to render all patients’ data( medical and operational) rapidly and timely accessible for management to make sound and informed decisions. As such, when, research nurse Wessam Ahmed, was pursuing to develop a system by which it would exercise a closer and more watchful follow-up on her low-grade glioma patients, with the support of the IT team, she devised a checklist which utilized the combination of both the Cerner system and other computing systems in use by the Research department. This is a list that will enable her to closely monitor and maximize the outcomes of this category of brain tumor  patients which require complex treatment protocols varying according to patient-response.

As for Dr. Walid Magdi Hassan, 57357’s researcher, he presented his department’s latest accomplishment: customizing the globaly used REDCap (Research Electronic Data Capture software) to integrate it to the Hospital’s health informatics systemby Cerner, which enables the automatic capturing of clinically recorded data of patients for timely statistics and reporting at just one click away. This rapid and accurate reporting system enables us at 57357 to monitor patients’ outcomes at any time point in time and to guide allocation of resources and utilization of new opportunities.

With the above three presentations, the Hospital was highly praised for having automated its cancer registry process by integrating Cerner Electronic Medical Record reporting capabilities and received an” Achievement & Innovation in Patient Care Delivery in Departmental Experience’* award.

Meeting with the mother of our hero martyr Ahmed Hegazy at 57357

“Donate to 57357”, used to say the martyr to his mother, “with 57357, we know exactly where the money is going and we trust them”

I met her at 57357 and she told me how she came to be informed of her son’s last wishes as he was killed in action:

“When Ahmed was ordered to serve in Sinai, he wrote his will and asked that it would be revealed only upon his death. In his will, he asked that a third of his inheritance would be donated to 57357 as an on-going Sadaka” said Hegazy’s mother. She adds that since her son’s visit to 57357 in 2008 with his military academy colleagues, he always advised her to donate her money zakat to the Hospital. He explained his preference for 57357 as the recipient of their donations because of its trustworthiness, transparency,  and palpable achievements.

“After his passing, and as 57357 was opening a new branch in Tanta, I opted to donate an on-going Sadaka in his name to this branch. This way, I thought, I would be supporting the modest people in Tanta and its neighborhoods”, said the mother. “The donation covered the value of a play room for the children in the new Tanta branch, reveals Hegazy’s Mother. My greatest joy was when I saw my son’s name on a plaque on that playroom; in fulfillment of his last wish. My wish is to see more 57357 branches in Egypt’s provinces, added the mother.

Before I start talking about Liver Cancer at the Children’s Cancer Hospital Institution 57357, two facts have to be stressed: First, we all agree that we cannot manage what we cannot measure. Second, it is thanks to the presence of an entire group of researchers from the Clinical Research department whose main mission is to follow up on patients and on the careful implementation of their treatment protocols, that  we are  able  to provide accurate,  comprehensive and timely data concerning the patients in this disease category.

Since its inception in 2007,The Children’s Cancer Hospital Egypt admitted to date a large number of children with liver cancer, but the sad news is, that 21.4% of those cases were are at a very late stage of the development of the disease upon admission; as such, they died either before receiving the treatment or at its early start. The reason behind that is that they were either diagnosed or transferred to 57357 too late.

As for the 78.6% of the cases, they are still receiving treatment. Contrary to what has been circulating that the Hospital is not admitting complex and difficult cases, people should be aware that  diagnosing a case takes time and multiple tests  such as taking a biopsy and analyzing it or doing a DNA test. Patients are first admitted and then are being tested to determine the stage of his disease.

Translation of article by Nashwa Al Hofy in al Watan News

How awful it is to feel disabled and useless next to a suffering person, being only capable of  silently crying, fervently praying, or helplessly sighing in expression of your failure in alleviating his pain. This is exactly what I went through during the time I spent next to the 8 year old Libyan girl Alaa, an in-patient at 57357 whom I was trying to comfort during one of my multiple visits to the Hospital. This was my first encounter with Alaa: the girl with a radiant face and typical Arab features, tucked in her bed, sometimes silently taking in the pain and the treatment and in other instances rebellious against her fate. Why is this happening to her? How long will it last? Having lost her hair hurts her deeply: she shows me a picture of her before the sickness at a family wedding. I look at the picture and watch her as she is speaking to me, wondering what to tell her. I offer her a children’s story by the writer Abeer Anwar. This is the story of a girl who went through the same experience as Alaa’s. The story is titled “Tomorrow, I will have hair”. I sit beside her to read to her the story. Silently she watches the book drawings as I turn the pages. As we come to the end of the story, Alaa is smiling and reveals to me that she prefers to move around without covering her head or wearing a wig. I tell her about the numerous actors who seek to be bold because it is trendy. She laughs candidly and we depart on a happy note. But soon enough, her mother informs me about her depressed condition and her refusal to take the medicine to the extent that her treating physician had to administer an anti-depressant. I go to tell her that unless she starts taking her medicine, I will no more come to visit her. She smiles back to me and tries to pretend innocently that all is well. I wonder why outside the walls of her room, people are still snapping at the world, why are not they living with joy and contentment and respect to each other?

I am swinging between despair for not being able to help Alaa and revulsion from the behavior of a certain group of people outside 57357’s walls  who have chosen conflict as their motto. But, hope slowly and strangely starts to overpower you when you happen to be inside Hospital 57357. As you walk along the Hospital corridors, whatever feelings of despair or disgust you might have accumulated, start to fade away: Here you are in a place that provides treatment for free for Egyptian, Arab, and African children. At 57357, you are offered the best quality service in terms of latest equipment and technology, sanitation, medication, follow-up, management expertise, and prevalence of the culture of love, generous giving, devotion and reward and punishment.  In this healthcare Institution, they have recently recorded an average cure rate of 74.7% which brings them closer to the world rates of 80-85% and establishes them among the leading pediatric oncology centers worldwide. Their expansion dreams are not over with the recent addition of 60 new in-patient beds within the Hospital and the opening of their 52 bed branch in Tanta in the heart of the Delta region. Moreover, news come your way that they have partnered with the top U.S. universities to offer Egyptian physicians a $70000 scholarship for a 24 months fellowship training program in Egypt and 6 months in the U.S. The joint program is to breed a new generation of physicians capable of contributing to the progress of pediatric oncology treatment and care. Also, this program is one of many to follow which will be offered in a variety of healthcare-related fields under the umbrella of a Health Sciences training academy. Thanks to our support and donations for this up-coming project, this tuition-based academy will be offering its services to all professionals in Egypt and the surrounding Region who would be capable of ushering in a new era in healthcare for this part of the world.

“My best wishes for a new Holy month of Ramadan, May it always rally us around the alleviation of the suffering of children. Egypt will be better thanks to all of us”

“Here, in 57357, your zakat and your Sadaka not only contribute to the establishment of a Hospital but to the building of a whole nation”

“I urge all charitable people to contribute to the support of 57357’s Scientific research and pediatric oncology fellowship programs. The most significant contribution you can make to the care of a sick child is your support for the provision of well- trained skilled physicians”

During his most recent visit to the Hospital, Sheikh Alazhary celebrated with the children the start of Ramadan by joining them in decorating the premises. He visited a good number of them in their rooms; reaching out to them and listening to their stories with great empathy, sense of humor, and love. He expressed his appreciation for all what is being constantly accomplished at the Hospital in terms of capacity expansion and advancement; referring specifically to the opening of the new 60bed extension, Tanta branch, and the newly recorded average over-all survival rate of 74.7%.

In a message to all charitable people, Alazhary encouraged them to donate their Zakat and Sadaka to 57357 which he qualifies as the Industry of hope and the Industry of a nation. He urged them to rally around the Hospital’s ambitious capacity expansion projects including the new 300 bed in-patient tower which will more than double the present capacity, the Health Sciences Training Academy, and the advanced research Institute. He added that the most significant contribution one can make to the care of a sick child is one’s support for the provision of well- trained skilled physicians which was enabled through the setting up of the joint 57357/Dana Farber Boston Children’s fellowship training program. Equally important is one’s support to scientific research which aims at improving patients’ outcomes and the quality of care offered to them. He praised all Egyptian immigrants who continuously support Egypt and 57357’s mission through our affiliations ECN U.S. and ECN Canada

He ended his message with a prayer:

We ask the Almighty Righteous God to make of this month a source of compassion, healing, peace and wellness for each and every sick person. May it bring forth restoration, tranquility and stability to each person on Earth. God Grant us healing and wellness so that hope is rekindled in us once again.