A Reference Hub in Gastroenterology

The Affidea Gastroenterology Center in downtown Budapest awaits patients with the continent’s most modern diagnostic equipment, the excellence of the national gastroenterology profession – trained experts with many years of experience – and a pleasant environment.

The number of newly discovered cancers dropped significantly in 2020 since the start of the pandemic, presumably due to the late and delayed conduct of various cancer screenings and other routine health examinations. One of those highly-trained professionals at Affidea Gastroenterology Center, Dr. Richárd Schwab tells Diplomacy&Trade that “we cannot really talk about capacity decrease. For quite a long time – it was a ministerial decree in Hungary (as in many other countries) that only emergency medical procedures were allowed. It means that preemptive screening examinations for patients without complaints were not allowed. To put it simply: this has been the case over the past 12-13 months. Postponing tests due to the pandemic, a worldwide tendency, is likely to increase cancer cases both in the number of patients and in the severity and frequency of the cases, unfortunately. The healthcare system was forced to postpone examinations but this also coincided with the perceptions of the population as nobody wanted to get into a hospital or even have a test if it was not something urgent. As a result, we encounter more and more neglected cases, patients who apply for tests because of long-standing health complaints.”

A reference hub of HD quality
The Affidea Gastroenterology Center awaits patients with Europe’s most modern GI endoscopy equipment. As Dr. Schwab explains, it is the Central European reference hub for the world renowned and most prestigious GI endoscopic equipment manufacturer, Olympus. “All in all, I can say that all the pieces of equipment at the Affidea Gastroenterology Center is of the latest technology available not only concerning endoscopy but also patient logistics, the service environment, making available a high level of treatment and service. For instance, it is unique in Hungary that all tests are recorded in HD quality and all patients receive the entire video material. It is important for later direct comparisons, 2nd opinions, referrals. HD recording is also important from the quality control perspective. So, it was a constructive step from Affidea partner EndoExpert Ltd., a Group Practice of Gastroenterologists, who brought all this expertise, international experience and combined with the solid capital strengths and market access of Affidea.”
He adds that although the pandemic also puts limitations on this activity but the cooperation with Olympus is intended to extend to a preceptorship program for training gastroenterologists on how a properly equipped private healthcare service center should look like and organized as a business. Everything is according to strict standards starting from the arrival experience to the quality of beds and patient comfort to the highest level of patient safety during the exams. This center is the first in the country to use ‘Scope Guide’ in the routine setting, a 3D-Image-Navigation System providing real-time 3D image of the position and configuration of the endoscope inside the colon. Navigation through the colon becomes easier and patients experience less discomfort as loops can be identified more quickly.

Experienced professional staff
Doctors working at the Center have extensive international experience, which adds to the quality of work and to the comfort of the patient. According to Dr. Schwab, the fact that Europe has become such an open space in the past twenty years has greatly improved the level of professional experience of physicians. “There are more and more doctors who had the opportunity to take part in post-gradual trainings and work abroad. In addition, in today’s online world, trainings have become so simple. Language proficiency is another important factor as those who have spent years abroad working or graduated in a foreign country will express themselves in a given language with much more confidence.” Citing his own example, Dr. Schwab says it basically does not matter for him if needs to speak to a patient in English, German or Hungarian. He himself had part of his medical training at the Universities of Vienna, London and later had work experience in Basel, Switzerland and received his MBA degree at a joint program of CEU and Purdue University in the United States.

Appeasing the nervousness about testing
By nature, many of the gastroenterology examinations are (or are believed to be) uncomfortable and/or painful. As to what is done, what new technologies are used to appease the nervousness of the patients, the doctor highlights that these beliefs may come from experience in the past. It is now for at least ten years that examinations in anesthesia have become widespread practice. “We also do some 90% of the diagnostic tests in propofol anesthesia, same standards as anywhere of the highest ranking centers of excellence globally.”

Do not miss your check-up!
Many future illnesses are not symptomatic in the early years, and the question also arises that despite the difficult situation due to the pandemic, what tests are the ones that should definitely be carried out. When someone had cancer of the GI tract in the past, regular follow-up exams cannot and should not be postponed. Same applies for advanced benign tumors that need thorough and regular check-ups, or for inflammatory bowel diseases (IBD), Dr Schwab says, giving a list of the most important examples. “We have recently had a patient who has had minimal invasive surgical procedures multiple times in the past ten years due to recurrent advanced rectal polyps. She was supposed to show up for the next control examination last December but she postponed it due to the pandemic. I managed to convince her to come and it really paid off: we have indeed found new polyps of advanced stage. It is very important that check-ups in such cases should not be put off – it is not worth the risk!”