The linear accelerator IGR machine at the newly inaugurated Curie-Abdur Razzaque Ansari Cancer Institute at Irba in Ranchi. Picture by Hardeep Singh

Ranchi, July 1: Celebrating Doctors’ Day on Tuesday, the first cancer institute started operations after a sarva dharma (all religion) prayer at Irba near Apollo Hospital, around 14km from the city.

The first patient, one Rajni Kumari, 38, was treated for free. In fact, 117 patients registered today.

“This shows how urgently the region and the state needs a cancer institute,” said Syed A. Ansari, the executive director of Curie-Abdur Razzaque Ansari Cancer Institute.

The institute is perhaps the first in the eastern region and the fifth in the country to have a linear accelerator with an image guided radiation therapy facility. “This facility will help in transferring radiation on the target cell, without damaging the adjoining tissues or cells,” explained P.D. Sinha, the medical superintendent of Apollo Hospital.

The cancer institute has been established as a unit of Health Care Global Enterprises Limited, a renowned group in oncology. The group is led by B.S. Ajai Kumar, an eminent oncologist from MA Anderson, US. “That will ensure the support of a highly-specialised and trained team of doctors, specialising in different kinds of cancer based in Bangalore through the tele-physics command centre there,” said Syed A. Ansari, the executive director of the Ansari Cancer Institute.

Ansari added: “The institute will be manned by Ravi Sekhar Patnaik, an AIIMS alumnus, a medical oncologist, Sekhar Keshri (DM in radio therapy), Sunil Kumar (DM in surgical oncology) and an alumnus of MD Anderson of US, who will be supported by Rajhan R.K. and Monamul Haque.”

The facilities available at this institute include medical oncology, surgical oncology and radiation oncology with external radiation therapy, and high dose rate brachytherapy.

Two experts from Germany would guide and supervise the installation of the radiation therapy unit, which will become fully functional from August, the institute sources said.