A dedicated clinician, institution-builder, and tireless advocate for cancer care, Peter Fore has spent seven years at the frontline of oncology nursing in one of the Pacific’s most resource-constrained healthcare environments often as the only person standing between a patient and a gap in the system.
He was the nurse administering chemotherapy for gynaecological cancers at Port Moresby General Hospital, PNG’s primary oncology referral centre, Peter manages one of the most demanding and isolated clinical roles in the country. With limited staffing, persistent drug shortages, and a growing patient load, he has responded not with retreat but with structure. He introduced chemotherapy administration protocols, streamlined scheduling systems to reduce patient wait times, and built a model of proactive outreach — personally calling patients to manage side effects, explain treatment plans, and provide the emotional reassurance that keeps women in treatment when fear and financial hardship might otherwise drive them away.
His approach to care goes far beyond the clinical. For women facing gynaecological cancers, many of whom arrive at PMGH frightened, underprepared, and without a support network, Peter becomes a constant. One patient, a young mother of two diagnosed with choriocarcinoma, completed all six of her chemotherapy cycles under his direct care and went on to celebrate three years of cancer survival. She still keeps in touch. It is a relationship that captures the essence of his practice: treat the person, not the condition.
Recognising that individual excellence could only go so far without systemic change, Peter took a defining step in 2022. Following the International Society of Nurses in Cancer Care Conference, he founded the Papua New Guinea Oncology Nurses Association, PaNGONA, building it from nothing in just three years, with no funding, no institutional framework, and no guarantee of success. Today, PaNGONA provides training, mentorship, and international collaboration opportunities for oncology nurses across PNG, connecting local practitioners with specialists from Australia and beyond through virtual learning sessions that would otherwise be entirely inaccessible.
Peter Fore’s story is one of quiet, relentless impact: a nurse who refused to accept the limits of his environment and chose instead to rebuild them. His legacy is already taking shape: in the patients who completed treatment because he called, in the nurses who now practice with greater confidence because of PaNGONA, and in a country that has, because of one person’s determination, a stronger foundation for cancer care than it did before.