Dr. Shaikha Abu Shaikha
Doha: Primary Health Care Corporation’s (PHCC) Screen for Life Program is constantly raising awareness on the importance of the breast and bowel cancer screening to be able to detect and treat the disease at early stages to achieve a high quality of life and a higher survival rate for participants.
Since the beginning of this programme, PHCC has been delivering screening services to all Qatar citizens and residents. “It is vital to always remember that screening saves lives, therefore we need to ensure that we are up-to-date with our screening programme to detect the disease at an early stage. We urge people to do the screening, it is an easy procedure, and yet we are aiming to make it easier and accessible to everyone in Qatar as much as possible,” said Dr. Shaikha Abu Shaikha, Director of the screening programmes at PHCC.
PHCC continuously aims to provide world-class care and services to the citizens and residents of Qatar as part of its mission. Qatar’s national vision and development strategy is always a main focus in PHCC’s objectives.
PHCC always strives to provide accessible, easy, and effective services. Bowel cancer screening home delivery of the FIT kit has had tremendous amounts of engagement and encouragement since its launch during the COVID-19 pandemic, and the number of follow-ups and screenings has significantly increased. For this reason, the home delivery service of the bowel cancer screening kits has now been reactivated via Qatar Post.
The programme encourages men and women between the age of 50 and 74, showing no symptoms related to bowel cancer and who did not have any colonoscopy within the last 10 years or bowel screening in the last two years to do the bowel cancer screening.
Home delivery service has been developed to facilitate performing the test by the participants. The process starts by either receiving a call from our cancer screening call centre to schedule an appointment or by participants calling the cancer screening call centre 8001112 to schedule the appointment or by a physician electronic referral to the cancer screening programme.
Then a telephone consultation will be scheduled with the screening team in which they will discuss participants’ details and eligibility criteria for screening.
The call handler will then go through the steps to guide the participant on how to get and perform the home screening test. After which, they will receive a communication from Qatar Post regarding the day of delivery.
The service will be particularly available to those who have previously completed their screenings, including elderly, people with special requirements, and those who cannot attend in person due to far distance.
The bowel screening test which is called FIT KIT (faecal immunochemical test) will be sent out in a sealed envelope consisting of three sample bottles, instructions leaflet, and a Bowel cancer screening health education brochure. The samples will all be collected on three different days within a chosen week then will be submitted to their convenient health centre lab.
People who wish to perform the test are advised to book an appointment, through the breast and bowel cancer screening programme call centre at 8001112, which is available from 9am to 3pm Sunday to Thursday. Screen for Life website: https://screenforlife.phcc.qa and social media platforms (screenforlifeqa) are always available to the public to keep them updated with all of the screening programmes and activities.
