Kanserli Cocuklara Umut Vakfi - The Hope Foundation for Children with Cancer
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Mission Statement
KACUV was established in 2000 by the doctors at the Istanbul Uni. Cerrahpaşa Medical School Pediatric Hematology/Oncology Service and the families of patients who receive treatment there.Located in Istanbul, Turkey one of the main purposes of KACUV includes creating and sustaining a suitable environment for treatment which is an important requirement in the battle against cancer.KACUV was also established for the purposes of enabling the continual treatment for the child whose treatment might otherwise be discontinued because of financial hardship;giving psychological support,which is an important need in the battle against cancer and createing a proper treatment atmosphere for the child’s psychology;conducting various activities in the Family Home and Hospital Services during the child’s treatment in order to increase his/her quality of life in psychological,social,physical and medical terms and raising awareness in the public and healthcare professionals of the need for early diagnosis of childhood cancer.
About This Cause
KACUV mission is to create a health care capacity which covers all necessary psychological, social, physical and medical needs for the treatment of children with cancer and to organize activities for the family, neighborhood, health professionals, public health care system and public which will improve the treatment process and will increase the life quality in psychological, social, physical and medical terms. Our Values: Child Oriented, Integrated Services, Volunteer Work, Cooperation, Transparency, Accountability Every year in Turkey nearly 3.000 children within 0-17 ages are diagnosed with cancer. There is a huge inequality across regions in necessary infrastructures for cancer treatment and distribution of doctors. This situation causes health migrations. Statistics show that there are 97 doctors and 37 treatment centers for childhood cancer in Turkey. This inequality causes families, who have to migrate for the treatment, to face with problems about accommodation, feeding and treatment conditions. From this point of view, the target groups of KAÇUV are defined as follows: 1) The children between 0-17 who are under the risk of disruption in the treatment because of their families’ financial problems, 2) The families, 3) The doctors and 4) The health professionals. Even though childhood cancer is a child disease, not only it affects children but also their families. The lack of treatment centers for childhood cancer in every city of Turkey reveals the health migration problem. While one of parents (usually mother) accompanies the child during the treatment, the other parent (usually father) tries to follow every step of treatment in order to provide the needs of children such as doctor reports, test, medicine etc. Even though there is an accommodation service at hospitals for one parent who will accompany the child, the other parent has no such opportunity. Parents dealing with financial problems often can not find a hygienic and a tidy place to stay. When it comes to outpatient treatment phase (chemotherapy or radiotherapy for example), the accommodation problem gets bigger and the whole family needs to find a suitable environment for the sake of treatment. That’s why KAÇUV defines childhood cancer as a family and health system issue and includes families of children with cancer, doctors and health professionals into its target groups. Program Run The Renewal of Cerrahpaşa Faculty of Medicine’s Service of Pediatric Hematology and Oncology: Childhood cancer treatment is a complex treatment which includes both medical and psychological factors. The treatment center should be hygienic, suitable for children psychology and fully structured. With this renewal project KAÇUV has ended ward system and its negative effects. Room systems are designed with modern standards for children and also for their companions. Rooms are equipped with special medical beds, furnitures, televisions and air condition systems. Thus, a suitable treatment process has been created for hospitals where children go through their vital phase of treatment lasting between 6 and 18 months. The School Program of the Cerrahpaşa: The childhood cancer treatment is a long-term process. In this process, the separation from family, the communication with strangers and the fear of being abandoned at hospital are biggest concerns for school-age children. Under normal circumstances, school is the most important activity for children in this age group. The illness makes it impossible for children to continue school. “Hospital School Program” has been launched to make children feel that their life goes on normally. A classroom has been established in Cerrahpaşa for primary and secondary school. With the cooperation with Ministry of Education, teachers were appointed to this classroom; children with cancer could attend classes and continue to their education in accordance with their treatment. The Play Room of Cerrahpaşa and Okmeydanı: In order to reduce phsycho-social problem of children who have to be hospitalized for long term during their chronic illness; hospital play rooms are being established and child friendly activities are being held in those places. In our country, neither hospitals’ hematology and oncology services don’t have any play rooms for children nor they can not use them effectively. KAÇUV established a child friendly and multifunctional Play Room at Cerrahpaşa and Okmeydanı. Play Rooms, which is enriched by educational materials for different age groups and different skills, support the development of children with cancer and also provide education and activities either in person or in group with the help of volunteers. KAÇUV is now organizing activities regularly in those Play Rooms with the help of individual or corporate volunteers. Educational Program for Hospital’s Play Rooms: Even though Play Rooms have been seen as an escape from physical and psychological suffering of disease; it becomes monotone for children with cancer hospitalized for a long term. During this long treatment process, children lost their interests for toys and educational materials. In order to keep Play Rooms attractive and to create interactive life places, KAÇUV prepared Educational Programs. Educational Programs, which are developed by experts, consist of differents modules according to age groups of children. Play Room Educational Programs play a vital role in supporting the treatment of children with cancer and they help also children meet with other children and develop peer relations. All these programs, which are implemented by KAÇUV’s volunteers, show kids that they are not alone in their struggle against illnes. The key part of Play Room Educational Program is volunteers. Volunteers, who participate to Volunteer Orientation Training, will come together at Play Room with children for art, music, science and hobby activities. Every volunteer who has no medically enfection risk and has no phsychological problems can join to Play Room Programs. Volunteer Orientation Training includes communication with children, sick child psychology, Hospital and Play Room rules and details of educational program. Besides individual volunteering, KAÇUV is organizing Corporate Volunteer Program via corporate social responsibility projects. The establishment of Play Rooms and implementation of educational program are organized only at Pediatric and Hematology Services of public hospitals. Play is My Medicine: With the funding of Istanbul Development Agency (İSTKA) and by the support of volunteers, we started the Project ‘Play is My Medicine’. This Project aims to support the cognitive development of sick children through creative activities geared around science, maths, art and play. The Project begins with a two-day training program for the volunteers, in which they learn how to communicate with children who are sick, how to work with children who are sick as well as practicing the activities which they will do with sick children. Publication about Childhood Cancer for Children and Families Project: Publication for Children: The child knowing the illness and what will happen during its treatment is very important for the success of treatment. The biggest problem for families is how to explain the illness to children and how to treat to her/him. Telling the diognisis to children is a controversial issue. Researches show us that children are aware of the severeness of the illness even thoug doctors and families don’t tell the truth in order to protect children. KAÇUV is trying to prepare and translate booklets for children with cancer in order to explain them the illness, the treatment process (bone transplant, blood test, chemotherapy etc.) in a suitable way. Those booklets try to explain children with cancer what will be happening with the start of treatment, how to deal with the treatment, what will be the side effects etc. Those booklets will be shared with all Pediatric Hematology and Oncology Services in Turkey. Publication for Families: KAÇUV is also trying to prepare and translate booklets for families in order to show them the physical and psychological changes that their children will experiences during the treatment. Those publications will also provide important information that parents have to pay attention such as feeding, hygiene, physical care and psychological support. There will be open resources in the KAÇUV web site for the use of parents. Publications prepared based on foreign resources are about to be published after the editorial control process finishes. Within the Strategic Plan for 2012-2015, KAÇUV is aiming goals mentioned below in order to increase the quality and variety of its services; • Activities to increase the capacity of the community to fight with the development of cancer in children, • Establishment of the Second Family House • Initiation of Children's Oncology Hospital studies • Establishment of an university specialized in the field of pediatric oncology • Short-term or long-term fellowship programs for health care professionals abroad • Creation of a Hospital fund in order to meet hospitals needs • Creation of a Family fund in order to meet needs of the families having financial problems Children Explorers in the Virtual World Project Child Explorers in the Virtual World project was supported by Istanbul Development Agency’s Financial Support Program for Children and Youth for the year 2014. 12-month project aims to support cognitive development of patients, to increase their self-confidence, to improve perception of the disease and adaptation to treatment process, and to decrease their stress levels through applications to which 8-17 years old children will participate via a web-based education portal. Children can reach at portal on www.cocukkasifler.org web site by the support of our volunteers. By this project, we strengthened our volunteering model and we trained 21 volunteer trainers who will train our volunteers with the peer education model.