MACSA’s Organizational Structure

During the treatment or after it, many patients, despite having achieved partial or complete recovery, often continue to suffer from many physical and psychological problems due to the complications of the illness and the treatment. In this situation, the patients and their families rehabilitation are very important for achieving maximum physical and mental health and acceptable performance.

In the situation that the patient’s physical condition does not allow him/her to attend an outpatient clinic, the home-care team facilitates the provision of services. The services are available in each hour of a day and all weekdays (even on holidays) on the basis of a patient’s or his family’s request. The team consists of a physician, a general practitioner, nurse, physiotherapist, occupational therapist, social worker, psychologist, and spiritual advisor. The home care network, by preventing unnecessary hospital visits, leads to a significant reduction in the cost of the health system and reducing the suffering consequences of it for the patients and their families.

The clinic will be set up in the hospital focusing on specialized services for palliative medicine (controlling physical signs). It optimizes the course of treatment in the hospital and providing supportive and palliative care to patients admitted to the medical departments. It is also providing psychological and spiritual care in the fields of treatment and relief.

Most of the patients experience severe physical conditions and complications throughout the course of their illness, which necessarily require hospitalization. In this condition, reducing pain and other distressing symptoms in the hospital environment have a top priority. In the context of palliative medicine, efforts are being made to provide clinicians that can provide relief services in a relaxed environment at the shortest possible time.

The community’s information poverty in the field of cancer control and the lack of public access to valid information lead to anxiety, unpredictable concern to the community, confusion of people with inconsistent information, and the reduction of the effectiveness of the charity and human institutions. Also, the unavailability of cancer patients and their families to eligible clinics is one of the most important problems that Iranian society face in curing cancer.

Catching cancer can influence the lifestyle of patients and their families. Many families are involved in the management of non-medical affairs, like home purchase, grooming, transportation of the patient and etc. The social network of supportive and palliative care aims to exploit social capacities to meet the patient’s non-therapeutic needs. In a network that qualifying candidates for receiving supportive and palliative care, the patient’s needs are provided by suitable volunteers and their needs are carefully managed and monitored.