About Us

Samita Mishra Memorial Foundation for Cancer Research is a nonprofit and non-governmental organization working actively towards a Cancer Free India by spearheading mass awareness campaigns and organizing early detection camps across the country. Our foundation is registered under 1860 The Societies Registration Act, 1860.

Cases of cancer in India are increasing at an alarming rate and India ranks highest one w.r.t the recorded incidences of oral cancer cases. ICMR report, projects cancer cases to reach a projected 29.8 million cases by 2025, as against the data of 26.7 million for 2021. The highest incidence of occurrence was in North India (2,408 patients per 100,000) followed by the Northeast (2,177 per 100,000). According to a report by the Indian Council for Medical Research on the ‘Burden of cancers in India’, seven cancers accounted for more than 40% of the total disease burden: lung (10.6%), breast (10.5%), esophagus (5.8%), mouth (5.7%), stomach (5.2%), liver (4.6%) and cervix uteri (4.3%).

These data are not to infuse a sense of fear, but rather that of urgency. Cancer, while maybe a biological disease that often is perceived for its violent and traumatic experience; one often forgets that it is also a social disease — one that destabilizes families at social, economic and psychological levels. It is to this end, that partly, the story of our organization starts. Ours is a small but a critical step in halting the destabilization effect of cancer on our society by reaching out to people, timely and helping them reach resources, timely.

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THE GENESIS OF THE ORGANIZATION

Mr. Prafulla Kumar founded Samita Mishra Memorial Foundation for Cancer Research in memory of his late wife Mrs. Samita Mishra who lost her life at an early age due to oral cancer. However, this was not merely a story of loss due to negligence or promptness in reaching out for treatment.

Samita, first experienced her symptom of oral cancer with a minuscule white spot on her tongue. After a week of using the first line of treatment, she reached out to her primary health care doctor. Over a period of a month, Samita visited three different doctors from three different specialties, based on recommendations from her doctors; each approaching her problem from the perspective of their own specialty. Ultimately, she was suggested in toto, to visit a skin specialist. A Delhi-Based, world-renowned skin specialist, personally administered her case for a prolonged period of six months, where after failure of multiple treatment methods and much insistence, an agreement was reached for a Biopsy. However, by then, after much delay, multiple misdiagnosis, and loss of crucial time, that would have made all the difference between life and death, Samita was diagnosed with end-stage cancer, which she fought ferociously, before succumbing to a second relapse.

It was the atypicality of Mr Kumar’s own personal experience that allowed him to see the murkiness of life post-cancer. Samita was a teetotaler and non-smoker. Her health history, precluded her from an early detection at two levels; at an individual level where the possibility of being diagnosed with cancer seemed far fetched and at a medical level where operationalization of diagnosis and treatment in an in-silo manner often costs patients unnecessary treatments, invasive diagnostic procedures, financial burden and most significantly loss of time.

Chairman, Mr Prafulla Kumar, in lieu of his experiences , understood the many blindspots and bottlenecks that pervade the path to a Cancer Free India. To this quagmire of roadblocks, he innovated a simple solution : “Cancer Prevention by Early Detection”. To this end, Mr. Kumar launched SMMFFRC’s flagship scheme, “Cancer Bhagao” which has been appreciated by media and other renowned personalities.

Why does SMMFFCR focus on Detection? Our field-work and observational data underlines that Cancer Eradication can happen at the coalition of two things : Prevention and Detection. Our mass campaigns and seminars work towards “prevention” via advocating lifestyle changes, where applicable and carrying out vaccination drivers where required. The other side of the coin is early detection. While prevention measures, like a HPV Vaccine or Quitting Tobacco, phenomenally reduce chances of contracting certain types of cancer, the modern environment with its carcinogenic heavy nature, does pose an additional threat to our health systems. It is here that early detection serves as a life-saver, for cancers detected in stage I and II show geometrically more chances of survival viz a viz those reaching doctors in advanced stages.

Thus it is through community awareness and mass-scale detection camps that we can envision a Cancer Free India.