Series of sessions challenges Portugal to “Tratar o cancro por tu»
At a time when one in five cancer patients saw their treatment being delayed because of the pandemic and around 100 million screenings were canceled across Europe, Ipatimup is starting with a series of sessions on cancer literacy, called “Tratar o cancro por tu”. The first sessions took place in Porto and Braga and the third one is scheduled for 17 Februrary in Coimbra. The topic will be the prostate cancer.
Ipatimup, which is now part of the i3S, considers it urgent to reintroduce the topic of cancer into public discussion and create opportunities to hear from experts about medical and scientific advances in the treatment of a disease that still kills more than 28,000 Portuguese a year.
With the initiative “Tratar o cancro por tu”, Ipatimup is jumping over the walls of science to meet the population in six municipalities: Porto, Braga, Coimbra, Lisbon, Vila Real, and Évora. In each of the six sessions, a different cancer will be addressed - lung, breast, leukemias and lymphomas, colon, prostate and skin - and in each of these sessions some of the best specialists in different medical and surgical areas will participate. The objective is always the same: to discuss the most recent therapies in the fight against cancer, to simplify concepts, to alert people to the need for early diagnosis and to put patients at the center of the discussion.
With these sessions, explains Manuel Sobrinho Simões (director of Ipatimup) the aim is to “reach people and contribute to cancer literacy, and also seek to humanize the way we look at this disease and understand it in a broader sense”. Sometimes, he acknowledges, “science has a language that is too hermetic and technical, so it is necessary to get closer to people and simplify explanations about the various approaches to therapy”.
The initiative will run from January to March 2022, with a fortnightly frequency, in a format that is not restricted to medicine and science. The sessions include, for example, a special performance by Pedro Abrunhosa, texts created especially for the event by Mário de Carvalho and Afonso Reis Cabral, a video testimonial from the director of the International Agency for Cancer Research, Elisabete Weiderpass, and testimonies and images captured by Kitato (instagrammer), Filipe Morato Gomes (author of the travel blog “Alma de Viajante”), Luísa Pinto (journalist) and Rui Barbosa Batista (travel writer and blogger).
Treating cancer for you will be within everyone’s reach. Each session will also give rise to a podcast that will be available on the streaming platform RTP PLAY and radio programs that will be broadcast on ANTENA 1. The media mobilization for these events is being complemented by dissemination by bloggers, journalists and instagrammers, who were on the ground collecting testimonies and observations focused on humanizing and overcoming cancer.
Calendar of the next sessions:
17 February – 18h30 – Prostate cancer – Coimbra – Convento S. Francisco
03 March – 18h30 - Leukaemias and lymphomas – Lisboa, Salão Nobre Câmara Municipal
17 March – 18h30 – Colon cancer – Vila Real, Auditório do Teatro Municipal
31 March – 18h30 – Skin cancer – Évora, Auditório da Universidade de Évora
You can do the registration here:
Coimbra - https://www.eventbrite.pt/e/bilhetes-tratar-o-cancro-por-tu-coimbra-251139203117
Lisboa - https://www.eventbrite.pt/e/bilhetes-tratar-o-cancro-por-tu-lisboa-251861252787
Vila Real - https://www.eventbrite.pt/e/bilhetes-tratar-o-cancro-por-tu-vila-real-251888113127
Évora - https://www.eventbrite.pt/e/bilhetes-tratar-o-cancro-por-tu-evora-251903158127