News Release
Groundbreaking Ceylinco Radiation Treatment Unit
Completes 1 Year in Operation

Sri Lanka’s only state-of-the-art private radiation treatment facility for cancer patients completes one year of operation this month and its owner Ceylinco Healthcare Services Ltd. (CHSL), reports that its first year was well above-target.

The Ceylinco Radiation Treatment Unit at Park Street, Colombo 2, formally commenced operations on 11th September 2007 with Sri Lanka’s first Linear Accelerator (Linac), the international Gold Standard in the delivery of accurate, intensity-modulated radiation therapy for the treatment of many forms of cancer. The Unit has in its first year dispensed 439 radiation treatments, 313 of which were from the sophisticated Linear Accelerator, the Centre said this week.

This included the milestone first ever IMRT (Intensity Modulated Radiation Therapy) carried out in Sri Lanka, a landmark that according to Senior Oncologist and the Centre’s Medical Director Dr. Sarath Abeykoon, signifies that radiation therapy has been brought on par with the best available in developed countries.
“The response from patients and the medical fraternity in our first year of operation has exceeded our projections,” Dr Abeykoon said. “The availability of a Linear Accelerator has enabled many patients to undergo precise 3D Conformal Radiation Treatments in Sri Lanka, thereby making overseas travel unnecessary and enabling substantial savings.”

“The bold decision by the Ceylinco Healthcare Centre to invest in an ultra-modern Radiation Treatment Unit has clearly filled a void that existed in the local healthcare infrastructure,” Dr Abeykoon noted, disclosing that the need for a second Linear Accelerator had been identified.

The six-storey, 19,000 square-foot Ceylinco Radiation Treatment Unit comprises of a solid concrete bunker built to specifications provided by the Atomic Energy Authority, the Linear Accelerator unit and two reception areas on the Ground Floor. The upper floors house the Brachytherapy unit, Mould Room, CT Scanner and CT Simulator rooms, Computerised Treatment Planning unit, Iodine Treatment unit, doctors’ rooms, two wards and individual patient rooms and suites. The unit also offers facilities for chemotherapy infusions in a comfortable, non-hospital atmosphere.

Cancer afflicts more than 10 million people annually the world over. In Sri Lanka there has been a steady rise in the annual incidence of cancer. The number of newly diagnosed cases of cancer reached 7,325 as far back as 1995 and at present cancer ranks fifth in the order of hospital deaths.