At the inauguration of the 12-day ‘Colorectal Cancer Awareness Month Art Exhibition’ in Abu Dhabi. Kamal Kassim/Gulf Today

Mariecar Jara-Puyod, Senior Reporter

Go thy way, whatever life brings, said a patient and his doctor.

The patient and the doctor were Ayman Awwad and Dr Salem Al Harthi as the Sheikh Shakhbout Medical City (SSMC) in Abu Dhabi opened its doors for a 12-day “Colorectal Cancer (CRC) Awareness Month Art Exhibit” on Monday.

At the lobby of the medical complex, jointly operated by the Abu Dhabi Health Services Company and the USA’s Mayo Clinic, 85 of the over 100 paintings of Awwad, a UAE resident since May 1988, shall be on display until March 24 and the community could also participate in the ongoing production of a mural.

Awwad whose hidden visual arts talent was accidentally known upon a Grade 8 classmate’s discovery of one of his drawings tucked within the pages of one of his books expressed his gratefulness to the hospital staff “from down to up.”

Fast forward to the present times, that accidental discovery that led his classmate to alert their art teacher who encouraged him to keep on practising, consequently had become instrumental in his healing.

Said Al Harthi, a surgeon in the past 23 years and among the multidisciplinary team of specialists taking care of Awwad: “So, whenever you have a symptom, you have to come forward and get diagnosed and get the treatment because the earlier you get diagnosed and treated, the better the outcome. This disease is curable. If you come early, you have 100 per cent cure. If you come late, that is different.”

“Keep busy. Always have the motivation, the courage and the will to do things. Do not just give up. Do not (wallow) in bed. Live your life as normal as you can,” he also said, on how Awwad has overturned an unpalatable reality into an inspiration to all.

Awwad recalled it was his indifference to a hospital setting that pulled him back in 2017 when the signs and symptoms of blood flow and weight loss started. He was advised in another medical facility to go for the diagnostics for the necessary validation: “I knew it was going to be a serious problem.”

Subsequently two years later, was his Emergency Room episode that led him to the SSMC where colonoscopy, biopsy and computed tomography scan had evidenced Stage 4 cancer that already metastasized to his liver and brain: “My doctors here said that I was already in that dangerous stage because of my bleeding. They removed half of my liver but they also (worked on) my brain before working on my liver.”

“He is still under treatment, but look at him,” said Al Harthi, happy that Awwad had even thought of putting up his paintings of either oil, acrylic or “one special artist’s pen” that bring life to portraitures, still, landscape, Quranic verses, and abstracts for the CRC awareness.

For Awwad, it is his optimism as he has embraced art as that which projects optimism, calm and coming from the heart that has helped him in his seven-year CRC journey: “I believe an artist is by nature optimistic. Forget the pain. Live life. Appreciate everything. My life is in God’s hands. I definitely believe that.”

SSMC chief executive officer Dr Nasser Ammash noted that it has been his routine to have himself checked since age 40 as genetics had affected “my brother, my father and my uncle.” Al Harthi pointed out that gone are the days when CRC was only meant for the sexagenarians and above since even those from ages 20 to 40 have become sufferers, “cases have been increasing.” Thus, his advice of going for any CRC-related test early.

March is the Colorectal Awareness Month began in 2000 in the USA through a “proclamation” by then President Bill Clinton due to the surge of cases.

According to the BMI Journal portal: “The burden of CRC is projected to 3.2 million cases and 1.6 million deaths by 2040 with most cases predicted to occur in high or very high (human development index/HDI) countries.”

HDI refers to the “summary composite measure of a country’s average achievements in three basic human developments namely health, knowledge and standard of living.”

In 2020, CRC had become the third commonest cancer in the world affecting both genders with Japan having registered the most number of new cases at 148,505 of the 1,931,590 and of the 930,000 global deaths, 60,000 were in Japan.