One of our main concerns in more recent years has been cancer survivorship, and especially the rather, shall we say, patchy handling of cancer patients’ discharge back into the community after their oncology treatment is finished. In Milton Keynes, anyway, we felt there was a problem with left hands not knowing what right hands were doing here.
We put together proposals for an event and follow up activity to address this problem and were awarded a generous grant by Macmillan, to carry it out. We called this project “Sharing The Caring For Cancer In Milton Keynes.”
That began with an exhibition and lunch for General Practitioners and their colleagues (GPs) and other community Health Care Practitioners (HCPs) on a very hot summer day a while back which, despite the temperature exceeding 30 Celsius, (!!) turned into an excellent networking event as well as everything else. The objective was to gather together examples of these support cancer patients can have while they’re in treatment and beyond.
Exhibitors included…
- Macmillan Cancer Support
- Our local wig service delivered by one of the top hairdressing salons in MK
- Various public health departments covering awareness, nutrition, exercise, etc
- MK Dons (our local soccer team) and the work they do for fitness in the community
- Age UK MK
- Healthwatch MK
- MKUHFT Breast Unit
- Nordic Walking
- Tai Chi
- Zumba Gold
- Several cancer support groups
- Willen Hospice
- …and several more
The Milton Keynes Cancer Resources Directory
Continuing on with this “Sharing the Caring for Cancer in MK” initiative, we published a printed directory with about 250 different local facilities for cancer patients to consider to help their rehabilitation. At our Macmillan Unit, a copy of the directory is included in every cancer diagnosis information pack, and copies have been distributed into several GP practices, clinic waiting rooms, and other prime locations.
As of October 2017 we are now on our third reprint of that directory, which we have expanded and updated with each printing. It is very popular both within the hospital, MKUH, and also in GP practices and even in some local pharmacies. For people who prefer to check this information out online, just click here – the same information and updated on a monthly basis which, as you know, isn’t possible with printed documents.
Needless to say if you see anything in the Directory which you believe is incorrect, and/or there are a name and details you feel should be added, please let us know – email us on info@mkcpp.org
Click here for the full content of the Directory.
Some moments from that Sharing the Caring exhibition a while back…
Sharing the Caring for Cancer in Milton Keynes