Story
In April 2008, two months after my 17th birthday, I was diagnosed with Hodgkin’s Lymphoma, a cancer of the lymphatic system and I have just completed 6 months of Chemotherapy treatment at the Western General Hospital in Edinburgh. It has been a difficult time but throughout, two organisations, Teenage Cancer Trust & CLIC Sargent, have provided invaluable support to me and my family, as they do for each of the six teenagers that are diagnosed with cancer every day in the UK.
I am now aiming to raise £10,000 for these two charities and have organised, with the help of family and friends, a number of local fundraising activities which include the sale of a 2009 calendar, entitled “ I can with cancer”.
I will continue to support the Teenage Cancer Trust fund raising activities in 2009 and the funds raised here will go towards the appeal for a new Teenage Cancer Trust unit at the Western General Hospital in Edinburgh. Work on the new Teenage Cancer Trust unit is expected to start at the end of 2009 and will be for cancer patients aged 16 – 24.
There’s never a good time to get cancer but teenagers can get some of the most rare and aggressive forms of cancer. But because only 0.5% of all cancers occur in teenagers and young adults, they are often misdiagnosed initially - decreasing their chances of survival, and excluding them from clinical trials. I was fortunate in that my cancer was diagnosed at an early stage and can be treated.
Teenage Cancer Trust builds units in NHS hospitals which improve the quality of life and chances of survival for young people with cancer. But as they receive no government funding, they rely on voluntary donations from the general public. It costs around £2million to build and equip a new unit. They estimate that with the units they currently have around the UK, only half of the teenagers diagnosed with cancer now have access to this dedicated, specialist support. Their aim is to build enough units so that, by 2012, every single teenager with cancer will be treated on one.
Thank you for your support - I really appreciate it.
Rebecca Clark
Age 17