The system-education campaign: the Power of Women.

Exercising honorary patronage over the event, Monika Wielichowska, Deputy Speaker of the Sejm, emphasized the role of conscious, empathetic women in caring for the condition of their loved ones.

- It is the woman's attentiveness that determines the health of offspring, partner, seniors. It is the woman who is more likely to form healthy habits, keep an eye on her children's vaccination calendar and take care of them when they get sick. Unfortunately, there are times when she no longer has enough time and strength to remember her own needs. Asked - what is the greatest value for them - Polish women point to health, then family and solidarity.

Education, prevention and diagnosis are the foundations of public health and the effectiveness of the therapeutic process. Therefore, let's not forget about regular examinations, eat consciously and be active. A common priority should be the standard of rapid diagnosis and the elimination of disparities in access to modern technology throughout the European Union," the deputy speaker of Parliament added.

Live longer

The chairwoman of several parliamentary committees closely related to health - Prof. Alicja Chybicka - reminded that the safety of this area of our lives depends to a great extent on ordinary, everyday choices.

- If we took smarter care of ourselves and the environment, worked, but not so much that we lose sight of goods more valuable than money, many dangers to ourselves and loved ones could be avoided. I love my job, however, if, by changing the lifestyle of Poles, the threat of cancer could be eliminated, I would become the happiest unemployed person. Momentarily, as a realist - I urge people to get themselves examined, get tested for oncogenic viruses and enjoy the benefits of vaccination. I know that it is essential to strengthen the role of PCPs in caring for our health. Certainly, support will be needed here also in financial terms, and this should happen. Without this, it will be difficult to increase the chances of comparable life expectancy for women in Poland and, for example, in Spain, where the average age is 86 years while in our country - 5 years less!

Embarrassing topics

Solidarity with women and determination to support them was also presented by Prof. Urszula Demkow, undersecretary of state at the Ministry of Health, in a two-way conversation with Prof. Ewa Barcz, head of the Department of Gynecology and Obstetrics at the UKSW Medical College's Międzyleski Specialized Hospital, recalling the silent drama of several million women suffering from pelvic floor diseases. Among them - urinary incontinence, excluding from professional, family and intimate life.

- It is not talked about in the public space. Patients themselves avoid the topic of diseases, socially pigeonholed as shameful. There is no agreement from me to describe any disease as embarrassing. They are, like any other serious health problems - diseases that need to be treated well; conservatively if possible or surgically. Aware of communication barriers, I emphasize the need to educate the public and decision-makers about the extent of physical and emotional suffering, as well as the risk of serious complications, not just urological ones. Epidemiological factors are age, childbearing, overweight, hard physical work, but also - genes. Statistics say that 20% of women in the general population will have to undergo surgical intervention, which, let's face it, is a last resort. Meanwhile, before surgery, there is a whole range of options for conservative management - pharmacological or physiotherapeutic, but not all of them are available. Overactive bladder syndrome, is one of the serious challenges of urogynecology, and there are many unmet reimbursement needs for physiotherapy, drugs or pricing of surgical procedures. We won't hear in the media that there is such a clinical, social and systemic problem - because we don't know how to talk about it without inhibitions, because it's not a load-bearing issue and won't "sell" on TV. Besides, how is it supposed to sell - when the patients themselves avoid the camera. So the level of social, including decision-making awareness, is low, and also among doctors themselves - knowledge of the subject leaves much to be desired," laments Prof. Barcz.

Dr. Michal Sutkowski, spokesman for the College of Family Physicians in Poland, is among those who know what is at stake.

- Along with the previous speaker, I sit on the Advisory Board of the National Association of Patients with Incontinence UroConti, which for years has been calling for attention to the drama of its charges. I would add that incontinence is not only a disease of the pelvic floor, but also the bane of patients with motor problems in, for example, RA, Parkinson's disease, and those taking diuretics. Faced with the challenges of overactive bladder syndrome, we would not have to be powerless if it were not for the fact that nothing has changed in the reimbursement area since 2011. This is hard to understand when we know that pharmacological advances would allow for effective intervention. In the area of reimbursement of absorbents, it is also difficult to talk about met needs with 3 diapers a day!!! In the face of such omissions, how to talk about the dignity dimension of the problem? Here we really need the solidarity power of causal women.

Attention for another "embarrassing" topic was once again demanded by Prof. Malgorzata Kolodziejczak, who heads the Warsaw Proctology Center at St. Elizabeth's Hospital, recalling the dramas of young mothers after difficult childbirth who experience not only gynecological, but also proctological complications.

- I and my team can help them, prevent suffering, disability resulting in family breakdown, professional exclusion, depression... Unfortunately, there are not many of us. What is needed is an awareness of the challenges, the most important of which are the training of specialized personnel and the proper valuation of surgical procedures in our specialty.

Joining forces

Many of the participants in the debate were unaware of the scale of the phenomena cited by Prof. Barcz, Prof. Kolodziejczak and Dr. Sutkowski, but having recognized them, they declared their support. Support was promised not only by Deputy Minister Demkow, but also by Dagmara Korbasinska Chwedczuk, deputy director of the Department of Public Health at the Ministry of Health, and Katarzyna Piekarska, chairwoman of the Parliamentary Group for Oncology Prevention.

Transparent disease

This is what Prof. Lucyna Ostrowska, president of the Polish Society for the Treatment of Obesity, called the challenges of obesity, calling for understanding that it is not an aesthetic defect but a serious, life-threatening disease.

- Today, the problem has become socially and clinically, such a great challenge that it cannot be ignored. We must confront it.

Prof. Mariusz Wyleżoł, president-elect of the Polish Society for the Treatment of Obesity, once again thundered to take all measures that could effectively prevent the drama of the patients themselves, and the crisis of our health care system, which literally - cannot bear the burden of expenses that obesity already generates. The needs for treating complications will grow exponentially.

- Let's remember that a patient is not obese because he has type two diabetes, but has type two diabetes because he is obese. The 500,000 cases of cancer in Poland are due to the fact that we do not treat obesity. We need to change the optics and focus efforts on prevention and prompt medical intervention. If we understand that the care of such patients requires an interdisciplinary approach, that in many cases it is not enough to recommend - eat less, and put emphasis on education from an early age and surround those already ill or at serious risk of obesity with proper, comprehensive care, then in a few years, in the statistics of health problems of Poles, there will be less: diabetes, heaps, strokes, hypertension and amputated limbs," appealed Prof. Wyleżoł in anticipation of the implementation of the KOS-BMI 30 Plus program.

Women of cause

The power of women today - high positions in many ministries, seats in parliament, leadership of institutions of the rank of NIO-PIB. It is also the strength of awareness that in public health, without consistently and quickly implemented decisions on education and prevention, we will not catch up with other countries. Finally, said Prof. Malgorzata Pawlowska, head of the Department of Infectious Diseases at the L. Rydygier Hospital in Bydgoszcz, strength is also the determination to insist on the implementation of globally proven measures. In the case of infectious diseases, a measure, simple to achieve, of success would be to reach HCV carriers who are unaware of the threat and save more than 3,000 Poles a year from death from hepatocellular carcinoma.

- Polish standards of perinatal care impose an obligation to test every pregnant woman for HCV infection by the 10th week of pregnancy or at the first visit to the gynecologist. This is important, but the creators of the European and American standards go further by indicating that every person should take a test for HCV, considered as cancer prevention, Prof. Pawlowska added.

- A proven systemic solution in the world to completely eradicate the virus is national eradication programs. We have been talking about it for years , making piecemeal efforts, organizing more pilots to prove what we already know. Based on the forces of POZ, the epidemiological situation can be significantly changed. We have the results of such solutions in the case of tuberculosis and cardiovascular disease. It's high time to deal with a virus we can beat once and for all. - added Dr. Michal Sutkowski

Prevention and diagnosis - modern, carried out professionally and in a timely manner - is the key to success in oncology today," Prof. Mariusz Bidzinski, national consultant in gynecological oncology, initiator of the establishment and leader of the Diagnostic-Clinical Coalition, related.

- For many years we have been striving to reduce the scale of the havoc that HPV is wreaking in Poland. Today we have the ability to defeat it, but still too few people choose to be vaccinated. We are talking primarily about young women, but not only. I would like to remind them that the vaccine protects their partners from cancers: neck, head, anus," added Krystyna Wechmann, a leader of Amazons and the Polish Coalition of Oncology Patients - partner organizations of the "Power of Women" Campaign, who has been promoting the principles of effective prevention and diagnosis of female cancers for decades.

The challenges of strictly women's oncology were also cited by Prof. Barbara Radecka, head of the Oncology Clinic of the Opole Oncology Center named after Prof. Tadeusz Koszarowski. Tadeusz Koszarowski, admonishing the expected systemic solutions in access to therapy to reduce the risk of recurrence in early breast cancer, and Dr. Katarzyna Pogoda from the Department of Breast Cancer and Reconstructive Surgery at NIO-PIB, who, together with Dr. Joanna Kufel-Grabowska, chairman of the Fertility in Cancer Section at the PTO, informed about the possibility of pursuing plans for motherhood after completing cancer therapy.

- The fact that we are raising procreative issues for our patients today is a huge success for medicine and a reason for pride for our environment giving evidence of effective care not only for life, but also for its quality, the most valuable dimension of which is the return to normal functioning also in the context of realization of parental plans," concluded Prof. Bidzinski.

The ability to preserve sexual and reproductive function, is also an expectation of urooncology patients . Many factors determine the outcome, but the prognosis is always improved by the timing of intervention and emotional support. Including the great role of close women.

- In 80% of cases, I meet patients outside my office who have been brought by the hand by their partners, sisters, daughters... This is a wonderful manifestation of our causal power," concluded Dr. Iwona Skoneczna, a urooncologist who heads the Chemotherapy Department at the Grochowski Hospital of Dr. Rafal Masztak.

With great satisfaction and gratitude, the participants in the debate referred to the importance of reimbursement decisions for IVF procedures, which allow the realization of a fundamental emotional need, which is parenthood. Denying the help that, thanks to medical progress, we can offer to couples facing obstacles on their way to having the desired child is a cruelty to the woman and her partner, but also an omission contrary to the public interest, said Prof. Miroslaw Wielgos, head of the Department of Obstetrics and Perinatology at the PIM MSWiA in Warsaw, and attorney Piotr Mierzejewski, co-chairman of the Health Expert Committee at the Ombudsman's office. Both also stressed the need for a greater level of empathy and concern for the safety and sense of dignity of women during pregnancy, labor and postpartum.

This is an important package of challenges for conscious, capable women, who are sure to pull it off with the support of conscious, capable men.

Source: press material