Indonesia

We are working to develop a new cancer registry, adaptive treatment protocols and train more healthcare professionals to provide better care for children with cancer in Indonesia.

Programme Centre

Dr Sardjito Hospital

Twinning Centre

Princess Máxima Center

Programme Lead

Professor Sutaryo

Dr Pudjo Hagung Widjayanto

Dr Sri Mulatsih

Dr Eddy Supriyadi

Dr Mei Neni Sitaresmi

Twinning Leads

Dr Gertjan Kaspers

Dr Margreet Veening

Dr Arjenne Kors

Dr Saskia Mostert

Start date

1992

Impact
Background
Problems
Key Activities

Indonesia has a population of circa 264,000,000 with about 30% of the population aged between 0-14. Approximately 60% of all Indonesians live on Java, one of the five biggest islands in this country. The Dr Sardjito Hospital is an academic hospital and the tertiary care referral hospital for the region, and also receives referrals from its neighbouring provinces. All children with cancer in the Yogyakarta province are referred to this hospital along with many of the patients from the surrounding provinces. As childhood cancer is not a top priority for the Indonesian Government, the management and care for children is very limited with almost no form of a cancer control programme, limited diagnostic tools and few nationally recognised protocols for the treatment of childhood cancers.

Limited number of healthcare professionals with adequate training and experience
Large numbers of families abandoning treatment
Limited facilities to care for childhood cancer
Lack of awareness amongst healthcare professionals and communities around childhood cancer symptoms and potential curability
Little or no accommodation facilities for families staying at hospital
Families living on limited income cannot afford to pay for treatment or even travel to hospital

We are supporting the development of more diagnostic tools
Workshop are implementing workshops to develop new, adaptive treatment protocols
Through our twinning partnership we are training local healthcare professionals on the early warning signs of childhood cancer
We are also raising awareness of childhood cancer amongst parents in rural communities

The numbers of newly diagnosed patients have increased
Survival rates have increased from 20% to 50% for specific types of cancer
Treatment abandonment rates have dropped from from 35% to 25%
We are currently working to build a new cancer ward and areas for accommodation for parents of children being treated