It was a Christmas gift to us all, one which didn’t need to be gift-wrapped or festooned with ribbons or even delivered by way of reindeer-drawn sleigh to be a present for the ages.

Earlier this month the Bermuda Cancer & Health Centre announced plans to introduce radiation therapy at its Point Finger Road facility.

This welcome step will finally allow many local patients to receive comprehensive cancer treatment at home rather than having to endure travel to overseas hospitals.

Anyone who has suffered from cancer or who has a family member, loved one or colleague being treated for the disease knows full well how going abroad to undergo therapy can be an exhausting and gruelling experience for patients.

Unlike the chemotherapy also used to treat cancer, radiation therapy does not expose the patient’s whole body to powerful cancer-fighting medications and the often very severe side effects which can include everything from anemia to gastrointestinal problems.

Radiation therapy is usually a localised treatment. It’s aimed at and affects only the part of the body being treated. The goal of radiation therapy is to damage or entirely destroy cancer cells with as little harm as possible to nearby healthy tissue.

But there are still after-effects which can be long-lasting, uncomfortable and unsettling.

Aside from the emotional disruption and distress caused by being uprooted from home, family and friends to receive radiation therapy abroad, Bermuda patients often have to contend with treatment-induced illnesses ranging from severe physical and mental fatigue to nausea to a number of painful skin conditions.

The stress of being in unfamiliar surroundings while undergoing treatment for a potentially lethal disease also takes its inevitable toll on both patients and their families. Then there are the attendant financial pressures. Out-of-pocket expenses while abroad soon add up as do missed days from work (most patients receiving radiation treatment respond well and are fully capable of returning to the job on at least a part-time basis while therapy continues).

Frankly, the economic benefits of the new therapy initiative will be every bit as consequential as the medical ones. Making radiation therapy available locally will help to stanch the ever-increasing economic bleeding being caused by the Island’s burgeoning cancer rate. Medical costs, lost wages and the economic impact on employers and insurers will all become more manageable as Bermuda confronts what amounts to an emerging cancer epidemic.

The grim reality is that fully half of Bermuda’s male residents and one-in-three women now face the prospect of developing cancer. Based on the Island’s current demographics the Bermuda Cancer & Health Centre anticipates fully 27,000 people will be diagnosed with one or other forms of the disease during their lifetimes.

The impact will be felt almost immediately. The centre’s business model predicts current costs to insurers will be slashed by more than two-thirds: the $10 million now spent annually to send residents overseas for radiation therapy will be reduced to somewhere in the region of $3 million.

By making the life-saving therapy readily accessible in Bermuda, the Cancer & Health Centre ensured this was a particularly memorable Christmas for many patients and their families.

And the organisation has also likely made certain thousands of other residents as yet undiagnosed will be celebrating many more Christmases in the years to come.