Discovery Fund Support of the Breast Health Foundation (BHF)
2017 - R500 000 towards the Nurses' Education Programme
The Nurses' Education Project benefitted patients that attend identified community health centres (CHCs) to increase the education and awareness of women around breast health and breast cancer. By having trained nurses perform clinical breast exams at CHCs, potential breast cancer in patients can be identified early, before patients are symptomatic. This will assist with the successful treatment and remission of these patients. The Fund supports the development of material for the Phakamisa pilot training programme, online material development and the roll-out of the programme in the Northern Cape and Eastern Cape.
June 2018 - R400 000 towards the facilitation of breast cancer patients from Limpopo
Discovery Fund partner organisation Hlokomela has a woman's health clinic. Cases of potential breast cancer were being detected, but with no effective referral pathway locally. This grant enabled the BHF to facilitate breast cancer referrals from rural primary healthcare facilities, such as Hlokomela. This enables rural patients to be seen and treated by Prof Carol Ben at the Helen Joseph Hospital.
November 2018 - R650 000 towards the development of a model/consulting project to scale up the Hlokomela service offering for cancer patients
In June 2018, the Discovery Fund provided a R400k grant to Breast Health Foundation (BHF) to raise awareness around breast cancer, diagnose women, and facilitate better treatment options for patients local in the local community of Hlokomela in Limpopo. To date, through an on-site screening programme at the Hlokomela Clinic, the BHF has diagnosed 12 women with breast cancer who will be treated at Helen Joseph and the Joburg General Hospital using the current grant of R400K. A financial modelling exercise however, made it clear that the cost (approximately R30K per patient) was too costly and logistically difficult for patients, to be sustainable in the long term.
The BHF team is therefore exploring different options for both diagnosis and treatment drawing mainly on locally available resources in the area around Hlokomela with back up from Johannesburg based government services where required. At a meeting convened by Jonny Broomberg, it was agreed that BHF should proceed with treatment for the 12 identified patients coming to Johannesburg and should ensure a detailed monitoring and evaluation component including video diaries and capturing of insights
Funding of R650 000 was approved towards the development of a model/consulting project to scale up the Hlokomela service offering for cancer patients in Mpumalanga.
February 2020 - R1.5 million (2019/20), R700 000 (2020/21), R700 000 (2021/22) towards the establishment of a chemo treatment centre at Tinstswalo Hospital in Mpumalanga, including the training of and upskilling of operational staff.
The first tranche includes CAPEX and OPEX requirements. The funding for the following two years is just for OPEX.