Promising a Better Cancer Treatment - The Nordic Page

25.06.2011 - Oslo

Promising a Better Cancer Treatment

Prime Minister Jens Stoltenberg signaled an arrangement for decreasing waiting time for cancer treatment.

The assistant general secretar of Norwegian Cancer Society, Ole Alexander Opdalshei says that cancer patients are suffering and have to wait in pain due to lack of resources at hospitals.

During the press conference held on Friday, Stoltenberg said hospitals would not keep the cancer patients waiting more than 20 days. The purpose is to prevent the development of the disease as a result of long-term waiting.

Norwegian daily Aftenposten had recently written about tragic cases of cancer patients who suffered from long waiting time for treatment at Norwegian hospitals. According to the interview in the newspaper, a patient named Therese-Lovise Colohan Valseth (32) had a more aggressive tumor as she was accepted to the hospital after ten weeks than the disease was diagnozed and there are many similar cases to Valseth's.

It was also revealed that a modern PET scanner at the Oslo University Hospital is not used because the hospital does not have enough money to hire a staff for it.