Known for its tropical beaches, opulent royal palaces, ancient ruins, and ornate temples displaying Buddha figures, Thailand is a wonderful country to visit in Southeast Asia. Thailand is also the home of HAE Thailand, a young organization that is working closely with HAEi as it rapidly expands its membership and advocacy efforts.
Suchitta Kengtanyagarn is the international contact person for HAE Thailand. She lives in Bangkok and is happy to share the story of HAE Thailand and the young organization’s goals for the future:
“HAE Thailand is currently in the process of being formalized as an organization, and we are very active in raising awareness among doctors, authorities, and the general public.”
HAE Thailand is a great example of a newly established organization exploring and implementing HAEi’s resources available for member countries.
“We are very excited to have launched a new website that was made possible by HAEi’s web hosting services. HAE Thailand is now much easier to find on the Internet, and together with our Facebook group, we can now better maintain a relationship with our members, supporters and people interested in contributing to our work”, says Suchitta Kengtanyagarn.
In today’s online world, having a website for your member organization is crucial. It’s a place where visitors can find out all they need about HAE and your organization’s advocacy work and aims.
“Next on our “to do” list is implementing HAEi Connect, as it will help us keep our members’ data secure and allow us to communicate with them in a faster and more efficient way. We are also interested in being part of the HAE Heat Map Survey, which will help us and our physician advisors estimate the number of people with HAE in Thailand”, says Suchitta Kengtanyagarn.
HAE is still a relatively unknown rare disease in Thailand, and the number of diagnosed patients is low. However, HAE Thailand is actively working on creating awareness, supporting patients in the country, and most recently helped translate the HAEi Emergency Card in Thai. The organization’s first official meeting was held around hae day :-) 2021.
Thailand has an ACARE center and three hospitals with knowledgeable physicians, which will improve HAE diagnosing and treating in the future.
“There hasn’t been much advocacy work in Thailand”, says Suchitta Kengtanyagarn, “and it is hard to make patients and relatives understand the benefits of working together for more awareness. We do, however, believe that our cooperation with the medical team and the implementation of the tools and services from HAEi, will help us on the path for faster diagnosis, access to, and reimbursement for modern HAE therapies.”
>> Find more information about HAE Thailand on their country page
