Sunday 1 February 2009

Marie Curie Cancer Care..

I thought I'd do a write up on the charity that I'm raising funds for, just so that everyone knows what/where their donations are being used for/is going to.

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Marie Curie Cancer Care supports 2700 staff and nurses that provide healthcare services for about 27000 patients each year. They mainly care for cancer patients, but they also care for other patients with life-limiting illnesses. Their service is free of charge to their patients and families. In order to sustain their activities, they depend on support from various individuals, organizations and they are partially supported by NHS. In year 2007-2008, they raised approximately £115 million.

Marie Curie Cancer can be said to be comprised of 4 main divisions- Nursing, Hospices, Research Institute, Palliative Care Research Institute. A short description of each division are as follows:

Nursing- Marie Curie Nurses provides personal care for cancer patients who are terminally ill. This allows the terminally ill patients to spend their remainding days at home, around familiar people and surroundings.

Hospices- The hospices provide general care for patients. The hospices also organize health clinics and social activities for patients.

Research Institute- Marie Curie scientists are actively researching cancer in order to provide a better understanding of the mechanisms of cancer cells. Some areas that they focus on are molecular motors, DNA replication, gene regulation, chromosome segregation, protein trafficking, cell cycle control, cycloskeletal organization laboratory and translational research.

Palliative Care Research Institute- I took the liberty to include a wikipedia definition of 'palliative care' since I figured that most normal people (like me) wouldn't know what that means. According to wikipedia[1]: Palliative care (from Latin palliare, to cloak) is any form of medical care or treatment that concentrates on reducing the severity of disease symptoms, rather than striving to halt, delay or reverse progression of the disease itself or provide a cure. Marie Curie Palliative Care Research Institute researches a broad spectrum of issues regarding palliative care. This includes evaluation of interventions and effectiveness in palliative care, assessment of psychological need, end of life care planning, sexuality, spirituality, child cereavement, evaluation of communication skills training for health professionals, complementary therapie and palliative care in advanced non-cancer conditions.

Alternatively, you can get more information on Marie Curie Cancer Care here.
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[1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Palliative_care

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