This volunteer network is their second home

Ranga Kumar, a volunteer counsellor, is on one of her periodical rounds to the Cancer Institute, to visit a new patient, Vijay, a 14-year-old, who has recently been diagnosed with leukaemia. Vijay only knows he has been afflicted by the disease. However, his mother Malliga is distraught and breaks down as she talks to Ranga about her son. 

Ranga assures Vijay will be all right soon. “Just six months, the medicines will cure him,” she says. She smiles at Vijay and asks him to ensure that his mother does not cry. In another ward for bone cancer patients, a cheerful Ajith waves out to her. “I am all right,” he says, before getting back to a game of carrom. In the last 35 years, Ranga has lost count of the patients she has interacted with at the institute in Adyar. 

It sees close to 50 new patients daily and almost 100 patients come in for a follow up and check-up, on any given day. Amid the fear, pain and shock some of them face; she helps them find solace. She acts as an emotional anchor during the testing time. “This work is like oxygen for me. It is my first home,” she says. 

Sanctuary, a cancer support group in the institute, has been working closely with patients for the last 25 years.  It was formed, when she realised that apart from the treatment, patients needed someone to listen to their worries. She says, “Not all, but some of them want to vent their feelings.” With a five-member team—two among them cancer survivors— after receiving training from a psychiatrist, Sanctuary counsels patients. 

Ranga adds, “The children may be too small to know what’s happening, but their parents undergo so much grief. The treatment for cancer is protracted and a large number of patients are from Andhra. They often feel lonely.” 

Geetha Sivaramakrishnan, another member of the six-member group, recollects that when she was first roped in by a friend to volunteer, she didn’t have the heart. “I couldn’t imagine meeting cancer patients. But the first day I went there, I found myself talking to them with such ease,” she says. 

She has heard painful stories from mothers, who were anxious about not being able to see their teenage daughters who were on the threshold of attaining puberty. And, the gratification when one of the girls, she counselled came back to see her after four years to tell her she was now working in a MNC. “I have even seen some patients passing away peacefully. 

These experiences make you stronger,” says Geetha. Being a survivor made Achaiah ND the ideal person for patients to talk to. Dispelling their fears and doubts, he says he has been trying to instil in the patients the thought that there is life beyond cancer. 

“The problem is when people think they are not going to survive. Having fought the disease, I could tell them otherwise. There needs to be a positive attitude,” he says.