‘Phobia that felled Srividya still on prowl’

Kottayam: Actor Srividya was an unfortunate victim of the phobia prevalent among women regarding breast cancer. She consulted oncologist Dr M. Krishnan Nair  when her disease was in the secondary stage.

Had she treated it earlier,  she could have  been cured. She  lacked  funds for the treatment also,  says Dr Nair, founder director of Regional Cancer Centre, Thiruvananthapuram, in his  autobiography, Me and RCC  (Jnanum RCCyum).

Srividya died in 2006 at the age of 53. “She was wearing a nightie and came in a Maruti car  to consult me for the first time at my residence, along with actor Poojappura Radhakrishnan,” he says.

Srividya was reluctant to consult doctors after she became infected with breast cancer.

“She was misinformed that the treatment will distort her face, blacken her skin and lead to loss of hair and removal of breasts. She got this information from her colleagues and relatives. She sought treatment at the secondary stage when cancer was advanced,” Dr Nair says.

Srividya came to him at the direction of  respiratory medicine specialist Dr Keshavan Nair.  

“I verified the CT scan and found that cancer had affected  her respiratory organs. In the check-up, I found that the right portion of her breast was blackened due to the disease. In the isotope scan which was conducted later, it was  found that the disease had spread  to her spinal cord,”  Dr Nair recollects. Srividya was not able to bear the expense of the medicines.

“She told  me that she had transferred all her assets to a trust, and it was  the trust which had to bear her treatment expenses. When we informed the trust members that one injection costs Rs 1 lakh, they  said the trust could not  provide that amount. However, a pharmaceutical company was willing to provide the medicines at  a discount. But though two dozes of medicine were given,  there was not much improvement,”  Dr Nair said.

Dr Nair told DC said that Srividya could have been cured if she had sought treatment at the right time.  The stigma  evident in the case of Srividya  is  prevalent among a vast section of women  and an estimated 30 - 35 per cent of them are infected by the disease in the state, he said.