About our charity
Charlie Bear was originally launched as a charity in 1978 by Daisy Clark MBE in memory of her husband Charlie. They made and sold, with the help of a team of volunteers, thousands of teddy bears. This enabled the purchase of the very first CT scanner in the area. Sadly, Daisy is no longer with us.
Since then the charity has continued to raise vital funds to help support people with cancer in a variety of ways.
This is now a dedicated charitable fund based at the Northern Centre for Cancer Care and supported by the Newcastle upon Tyne Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust.
We have decided to launch an appeal for £3m for a specialised piece of equipment for the delivery of cybersurgery.
Charlie Bear Cybersurgery Appeal Cybersurgery is a radiotherapy technique which delivers radiotherapy in a very specific and precise way. It is able to treat tumours arising in the brain, brain stem, spinal cord, lung, pancreas, liver, prostate and neck, which are often difficult to approach surgically. Due to the ability of the machine to focus so precisely on small tumours, the potential for damaging surrounding normal, and often important, structures around the tumour is small. Conventional radiotherapy and surgery are less precise and collateral damage to normal tissue is likely. The concept of the Stereotactic Radiotherapy or Cybersurgery can be explained in simple terms to ‘being able to remove a grape from the middle of an orange without damaging the orange’. It is very effective in the treatment of metastatic deposits as well as in certain benign conditions. We believe that this very sophisticated and highly effective piece of equipment will be an enormous asset in the treatment of NHS patients in the North East. There are only currently two other machines within NHS facilities in the UK both of which are around London. It is hoped that this appeal will raise sufficient funds for the purchase of a cybersurgery radiotherapy machine to deliver this highly effective and specialised form of treatment. This would be the ultimate jewel in the crown for cancer treatment in the north east of England. We see this not only as a means of providing a truly exceptional piece of life saving equipment for the north east, but also to provide a means for further propagation of the community culture and spirit within the area of which we are so proud. If you would like to be involved in raising funds for this please contact Angie Taylor, Charlie Bear Fundraiser on 0191 213 8615 who will be pleased to advise. For further information visit our dedicated Charlie Bear Page on the web You can also like our Charlie Bear Facebook page and visit our page on the Newcastle upon Tyne Hospitals NHS Foundation trust webpage.
How you can help
We are looking for donations, time, ideas, support - anything and everything to help raise money and awareness of Charlie Bear.
Please contact the Charlie Bear office on 0191 213 8615 where our staff are waiting to take your call
Thank you
Nicola Bruce
Charity Co-Chair and Directorate Manager
Northern Centre for Cancer Care
Freeman Hospital
