Ryan Ba­choo

Lead Ed­i­tor - News­gath­er­ing

ryan.ba­choo@cnc3.co.tt

Can­cer touch­es al­most every fam­i­ly in Trinidad and To­ba­go, of­ten qui­et­ly, some­times sud­den­ly, but al­ways pro­found­ly. Be­hind the sta­tis­tics, screen­ing cam­paigns and fundrais­ing dri­ves are in­di­vid­u­als who have car­ried the re­spon­si­bil­i­ty of steer­ing in­sti­tu­tions through grief, hope, lim­it­ed re­sources and grow­ing pub­lic ex­pec­ta­tion. One such in­di­vid­ual is Robert Du­mas, for­mer chair­man of the Trinidad and To­ba­go Can­cer So­ci­ety, whose tenure co­in­cid­ed with an ex­pand­ing na­tion­al con­ver­sa­tion about can­cer pre­ven­tion, pa­tient sup­port and the role of civ­il so­ci­ety in pub­lic health.

Du­mas’ lead­er­ship was shaped not on­ly by board­room de­ci­sions and stake­hold­er ne­go­ti­a­tions, but by deeply per­son­al ex­pe­ri­ence. The loss of his fa­ther to can­cer trans­formed ad­vo­ca­cy from an ab­stract cause in­to a lived com­mit­ment, ground­ing his ap­proach in em­pa­thy and hu­man con­nec­tion. Dur­ing his time at the helm, the So­ci­ety nav­i­gat­ed per­sis­tent fund­ing chal­lenges, in­creas­ing de­mand for ser­vices, and long­stand­ing struc­tur­al is­sues such as the need for a per­ma­nent home, all while striv­ing to keep pa­tients and sur­vivors at the cen­tre of its work.

In this Q&A, Du­mas re­flects on his most sig­nif­i­cant con­tri­bu­tions, the hard­est chal­lenges faced by the or­gan­i­sa­tion, and how the can­cer land­scape has evolved lo­cal­ly. He al­so speaks can­did­ly about gaps that re­main in pre­ven­tion, da­ta col­lec­tion and psy­choso­cial sup­port, and of­fers point­ed ad­vice to both cur­rent lead­er­ship and pol­i­cy­mak­ers on mov­ing from aware­ness to ac­tion.

Q: What do you con­sid­er your most sig­nif­i­cant con­tri­bu­tion dur­ing your tenure as chair­man of the T&T Can­cer So­ci­ety?

A: My most sig­nif­i­cant con­tri­bu­tion dur­ing my tenure as Chair­man of the Trinidad and To­ba­go Can­cer So­ci­ety has been help­ing to strength­en and hu­man­ise the So­ci­ety’s re­la­tion­ships with all stake­hold­ers, while keep­ing peo­ple at the cen­tre of every­thing we do. I be­lieve I made a mean­ing­ful im­pact through the re­la­tion­ships I built and nur­tured with cor­po­rate part­ners, which helped ex­pand col­lab­o­ra­tion, in­crease vis­i­bil­i­ty for our ini­tia­tives, and strength­en sup­port sys­tems. The re­la­tion­ships I hold most dear, how­ev­er, are those with can­cer sur­vivors and the com­mu­ni­ties we serve, whose re­silience and trust con­tin­u­al­ly re­mind me why this work mat­ters.

My com­mit­ment to this work is deeply per­son­al. Be­ing touched by can­cer through the loss of my fa­ther pro­found­ly deep­ened my de­sire to make a dif­fer­ence and trans­formed ad­vo­ca­cy in­to a call­ing. That ex­pe­ri­ence fu­eled my de­ter­mi­na­tion to en­sure that no one fac­ing can­cer feels alone, un­heard, or with­out sup­port, and to help fos­ter a cul­ture of em­pa­thy, com­pas­sion, and pur­pose with­in the So­ci­ety.

What were the biggest chal­lenges the or­gan­i­sa­tion faced while you were at the helm, and how were they ad­dressed?

Fund­ing and fi­nan­cial sus­tain­abil­i­ty have con­sis­tent­ly been among the most sig­nif­i­cant chal­lenges for the TTCS, as is the case for most NGOs. While the So­ci­ety re­ceives gov­ern­ment sub­ven­tions, these funds alone are not suf­fi­cient to meet the grow­ing de­mand for pro­grammes, pa­tient sup­port ser­vices, ed­u­ca­tion, and op­er­a­tional costs. As a re­sult, the TTCS has al­ways de­pend­ed heav­i­ly on fundrais­ing ini­tia­tives and strong cor­po­rate col­lab­o­ra­tions to bridge the gap and sus­tain its work.

One of the most chal­leng­ing ar­eas, in my opin­ion, is par­tic­u­lar­ly in re­la­tion to the So­ci­ety’s need for a new home. Al­though the TTCS has been en­gag­ing the gov­ern­ment for sup­port to­ward this crit­i­cal ob­jec­tive, pro­gress­ing from ad­vo­ca­cy to tan­gi­ble out­comes has been slow and com­plex. En­sur­ing ad­e­quate phys­i­cal space is es­sen­tial for ex­pand­ing ser­vices, im­prov­ing pa­tient ex­pe­ri­ence, and strength­en­ing op­er­a­tional ca­pac­i­ty, and this re­mains a pri­or­i­ty area re­quir­ing con­tin­ued fo­cus, part­ner­ship, and com­mit­ment.

How has the can­cer land­scape in Trinidad and To­ba­go changed over the years you were in­volved with the So­ci­ety?

We cer­tain­ly have seen an in­crease in over­all aware­ness through an in­creased TTCS cam­paign of ed­u­ca­tion, aware­ness and the need for ear­ly screen­ing. Though ac­tu­al da­ta col­lec­tion across both pub­lic and pri­vate sec­tors still re­mains a chal­lenge, to date, the top can­cers haven’t shift­ed dra­mat­i­cal­ly in the years I served on the board, with breast and prostate can­cers re­main­ing the most com­mon­ly di­ag­nosed over­all, and col­orec­tal and lung can­cers con­tin­u­ing to be sig­nif­i­cant con­trib­u­tors to mor­bid­i­ty.

Were there any dif­fi­cult de­ci­sions you had to make that the pub­lic may not ful­ly un­der­stand?

None that I re­call. A few changes in man­age­ment oc­curred at Board lev­el, but that was as a re­sult of com­mit­ment chal­lenges dur­ing any giv­en pe­ri­od, as even though it is in a vol­un­tary ca­pac­i­ty, the port­fo­lio is very de­mand­ing.

In your view, what gaps still ex­ist in can­cer pre­ven­tion, treat­ment, and sup­port ser­vices lo­cal­ly?

The T&T Can­cer So­ci­ety is not in­volved in treat­ment; that said, it was part of my long-term vi­sion for the so­ci­ety to col­lab­o­rate with oth­er or­gan­i­sa­tions to fa­cil­i­tate an end-to-end ser­vice. That said, pre­ven­tion is still un­der­pow­ered and un­der-pri­ori­tised. We do aware­ness; we don’t do enough in­ter­ven­tion. Can­cer ed­u­ca­tion doesn’t mean­ing­ful­ly start ear­ly enough, nor is it in­te­grat­ed in­to long-term health lit­er­a­cy. Bot­tom line is, we are still re­act­ing to can­cer far more than we’re pre­vent­ing it.

How im­por­tant is pub­lic trust and trans­paren­cy for or­gan­i­sa­tions like the T&T Can­cer So­ci­ety, and how was that main­tained dur­ing your lead­er­ship?

Re­ceiv­ing a gov­ern­ment sub­ven­tion, and cor­po­rate fund­ing re­quires im­ple­men­ta­tion and ad­her­ence to strict gov­er­nance poli­cies, and mon­i­tor­ing for short and long change of pa­tient nav­i­ga­tion map­ping and sub­se­quent sys­tems to en­sure best prac­tices, ef­fi­cien­cy, and ul­ti­mate­ly the cus­tomer ex­pe­ri­ence.

What ad­vice would you give to the cur­rent lead­er­ship and to pol­i­cy­mak­ers work­ing to im­prove can­cer care in Trinidad and To­ba­go?

To the T&T Can­cer So­ci­ety, it would be to keep fo­cused on mis­sion, but with that in­clu­siv­i­ty of oth­er NGOs, pri­vate in­sti­tu­tions, and the re­gion­al health au­thouri­ties is a must. The old African proverb, if you want to go fast, go alone, but if you want to go far, go to­geth­er. The need for leg­is­la­tion to tru­ly col­late da­ta in both pri­vate and pub­lic health in­sti­tu­tions is crit­i­cal to de­ter­min­ing where fo­cus is placed, with re­al-time, mea­sur­able da­ta. Keep the peo­ple, both in­ter­nal and ex­ter­nal, top of mind with kind­ness, em­pa­thy and de­liv­er­ing 100 per cent each and every time.

To ALL in­volved in the dri­ve, pol­i­cy must treat the per­son, not just the dis­ease. Psy­choso­cial sup­port, care­giv­er as­sis­tance, sur­vivor­ship plan­ning, and ear­ly pal­lia­tive care should be em­bed­ded in­to stan­dard care, not left to char­i­ty or chance. Pre­ven­tion al­so needs to be el­e­vat­ed to a true na­tion­al pri­or­i­ty, wo­ven in­to ed­u­ca­tion, food pol­i­cy, en­vi­ron­men­tal reg­u­la­tion, and com­mu­ni­ty life. The op­por­tu­ni­ty now is to move from ex­pand­ing ser­vices to de­liv­er­ing ex­cel­lence—a sys­tem that di­ag­noses ear­li­er, treats more hu­mane­ly, and sup­ports peo­ple long af­ter treat­ment ends.