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Group from Hiroshima set to offer medical assistance in Cambodia

by Hidetoshi Arioka, Staff Writer

A group from Japan will visit Cambodia from March 5 to 7 to provide medical assistance. The group, which includes Koki Inai, emeritus professor at Hiroshima University and an expert in pathology, will conduct examinations for breast cancer and offer technical guidance to local doctors and laboratory technicians.

The group consists of five people. Along with Dr. Inai, who also serves as a board member of the Hiroshima South Rotary Club, the others are Kenji Higaki, vice director of Hiroshima Municipal Hospital, located in downtown Hiroshima, two members of the Rotary Club, and a laboratory technician. They will carry out medical examinations on 200 women from their 40s to their 60s in Kampot Province, southern Cambodia by inquiring about health conditions, checking for abnormalities by hand, and using echo detection. In addition, they will teach local doctors and laboratory technicians how to conduct such examinations and use echo devices. They will also offer financial support and other forms of assistance for patients who require more thorough examinations and operations.

Hiroshima South Rotary Club has been providing financial support to farming communities in Cambodia since 2003 for the purpose of digging wells. In May 2012, Dr. Inai heard from officials at Cambodia’s Ministry of Health that following the genocide that occurred in that nation under Pol Pot and the Khmer Rouge, doctors there are not well trained and the mortality rate from breast cancer is high. This was the impetus for providing medical assistance.

Dr. Inai said that the group will mull ways to offer continuing medical support to the people of Cambodia.

(Originally published on February 27, 2014)

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