How and where we want to be cared for at end of life still seems to be something of a taboo subject in our society, even between friends and family. But with calls for reform of the care system hitting the headlines and the government due to publish a white...
(3) Comments | Posted 26 March 2012 | 00:00
Cancer is predominantly a disease of age. Half of people newly diagnosed with cancer in the UK are aged 70 or over. Despite this, there are around 14,000 avoidable cancer deaths in patients over 75 in the UK each year and cancer survival rates in this age group are among...
(1) Comments | Posted 26 January 2012 | 23:00
Everyone rightly sympathises with those diagnosed with cancer. With the numbers of us being diagnosed with cancer having risen from one in three to over four in 10, it's a subject that hits very close to home.
Few of us will not have cancer in our home at some...
(0) Comments | Posted 12 January 2012 | 14:54
Last night's crucial vote in the House of Lords is a tremendous victory for cancer patients. But more than that, it was a strong warning to the government that people do not accept that it is necessary to take money from the ill and the disabled in order to cut...
(1) Comments | Posted 22 November 2011 | 08:25
New cancer statistics often make the headlines. Politicians use them consistently to either berate or praise the NHS. We compare ourselves against our European neighbours with them, and we seem to have an unending appetite for crunching numbers to contextualise this disease that so many people fear.
But what...
(1) Comments | Posted 20 October 2011 | 21:00
When Macmillan Cancer Support was established a hundred years ago, if you got cancer you lost your income and quickly slipped into poverty.
So the founder of the charity, Douglas Macmillan, handed out sacks of coal to help people with cancer heat their homes. A century on, and as...
(0) Comments | Posted 27 September 2011 | 13:32
I was extremely interested to read a report released today in The Lancet Oncology arguing that the cost of treating cancer in the developed world is "heading towards a crisis". In particular, I was drawn to the report's conclusion that solutions to the problem require vision. I too believe we...
(7) Comments | Posted 13 September 2011 | 00:00
Raise the subject of benefits at a dinner party or amongst friends over a drink and lively debate will quickly ensue, with the conversation swiftly covering rioters, looters, and so-called benefit-cheats. And one could argue for hours with little resolution about the willingness of one council to withdraw support from...
(2) Comments | Posted 17 May 2012 | 00:00