Assam: AMCH doctor gets patent for Self Breast Examination Demonstration Model

A correspondent

DIBRUGARH: A Self Breast Examination Demonstration Model developed by well known breast cancer researcher Dr Gayatri Gogoi was awarded with a design patent from the Patent Office, government of India recently. She was issued the patent (Design no: 395195-001) by the Controller General of Patents, Design and Trade Marks.

Dr Gayatri Gogoi is an associate professor at the Assam Medical College and Hospital (AMCH), Dibrugarh and Adjunct Researcher to ICMR Regional Medical Research Centre, North East. While working in breast cancer research, she used to observe that diagnosis of the cancer is late inspite of being an external organ due to low level of awareness about the disease risk. Another major obstacle is even if breast cancer screening by mammography is available however it is still not feasible for common Indian women. It is associated with cost and technical expertise. Tata memorial Hospital Mumbai showed that health care worker can be trained to detect cancer effectively and save thirty thousand lives in India.

“Breast cancer is leading cancer globally as well as in India . Every 4 minutes a new breast cancer case diagnosed and almost 50% of them diagnosed at advanced stage. Therefore, in India cancer awareness among public and implementation of suitable user friendly breast cancer screening programme is an urgent need,” she said.

For Breast Cancer screening, the simple affordable model can be used to demonstrate a ‘Show How’ level of knowledge transfer to first train ASHAs ANMs of primary health centres and sub centre. Then they can demonstrate self breast examination to be practised by women themselves. Extensive training is a must so that they are confident and interested to continue it for their population. Only when population around them will adopt this simple method, the desired outcome can be achieved. Currently, only with the help of a diagram in a paper the training is being offered and therefore there is a gap of learning and teaching the skill quickly and confidently.

“This SBE Demonstration model is designed from a everyday use easily available ordinary material which is safe eco friendly, very low cost, no side effects, light weight easy to carry to anywhere by ASHAs ANMs. More over, it is acceptable for female to demonstrate in open platform keeping in mind of sensitivity of culture. This model can be a game changer if used by Primary Health Centre or Sub centre to teach the right technique to detect any abnormality at the earliest,” she added.  

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