Each year Halsall chooses one charity to raise money for; this year’s chosen charity is Teenage Cancer Trust. So far, we have raised over £7,000 for the charity over a range of fundraising activities. Our next event is our golf day on Thursday 14th September at Farrington Park Golf Club. If you’re interested in taking part please contact Natalie Whiting.
Two members of our team Cally Lane and Natalie Whiting were recently invited to visit Teenage Cancer Trust’s specialist unit, Area 61, on the Bristol Haematology and Oncology Centre. South West’s Teenage and Young Adult Lead Nurse Jamie Cargill took the two on a tour of the ward, introducing them to the expert staff, showing them the facilities and giving them a feel for what it means to be a young person with cancer.
Teenage Cancer Trust opened Bristol’s specialist unit in June 2014, providing young people aged 16 – 24 with cancer a place where they can be cared for and supported by a team of expert staff and other young people with cancer too.
Named Area 61 by the patients, the unit has two floors, with one floor dedicated to in-patients with five en-suite bedrooms with sofa beds for family and friends to stay overnight. It also has a large social area where young people can play pool, listen to music, play games consoles or watch films on the latest Smart TVs. There’s also a kitchen and dining space where meals can be cooked at all times of day and night, as well as a lounge for family members to take a break. The other floor is for day patients, featuring three treatment pods, two consulting rooms, a procedure room, a social space which includes entertainment and gaming consoles and a waiting area with café.
The charity funds five expert staff in the Bristol area: a Lead Nurse, a Youth Support Co-ordinator, two Clinical Liaison Nurse Specialists and an MDT Co-ordinator. Teenage Cancer Trust Nurses are experts in teenage and young adult cancer care. They are professionally trained to know how to communicate with and support young people with cancer. The youth support coordinator helps young people share their experiences and fears with each other, encourages them to socialise by arranging activities and outings and enables them to participate in a peer support group.
Each year, over 200 young people from Bristol, Somerset, Wiltshire, Gloucestershire, Devon and Cornwall, are diagnosed with cancer. Across the UK, seven are diagnosed every day. Traditionally treated either on a children’s ward or on an adult ward often alongside elderly patients, young people can feel extremely isolated during treatment, some never meeting another young person with cancer. Being treated alongside others their own age, by experts in teenage and young adult cancer care, can make a huge difference to their experience.
If you’d like to help us reach our target of £15,000, please visit our JustGiving page or contact Natalie Whiting – natalie.whiting@halsall.co.uk.