The aim of the Christian Blandford fund is to improve the comfort of children and their families, particularly those affected by cancer, during prolonged stays in local NHS hospitals.
Usually treatment is given under a ‘joint care’ program where specialist hospitals provide the main treatment and local hospitals provide emergency care. For example, Christian received all his radiotherapy and chemo at the Royal Marsden, but when he spiked a temperature while neutrapenic (no immune system), we would drive him to St George’s Hospital in Tooting for emergency treatment. Christian also had his kidney tumour removed at St George’s and recovered in their excellent Paediatric Intensive Care Unit.
Despite the high levels of care, the standards of comfort and equipment at St George’s were far inferior to those at the Royal Marsden. This is because the high profile, specialist hospitals tend to attract more funds from government and charity. The curtains in the Pinkney ward where Christian was treated were so thin all the kids would wake up at the crack of dawn in the summer and the parents slept on old, lumpy sofa beds. This is why we decided to concentrate our fundraising efforts on the NHS hospitals. So far, all the money raised has been donated to St George’s.
February 2010
St George's have just released a newsletter with the highlights of 2009.
Here is what they say
It has been an extremely busy and profitable year for the Christian Blandford Fund and there have been many achievements to date. The following is an overview of this success:
• The Child Development Centre opened its doors following a £550k refurbishment in June 2009, having received a £100k contribution from the Christian Blandford Fund. The CDC provides services for children with developmental difficulties over a broad spectrum of disciplines
• All patient rooms on Pinkney now have wall mounted flat screen TVs and DVD players
• A large flat screen tv has been installed in the parents’ room
• A number of hand held computer games, games consoles and games have been purchased for use by Pinckney patients
• New sofa beds have been ordered for parental use
• Magnetic white boards and laminated posters will be provided to allow children to customise their rooms with their own familiar decor
• A portable ultrasound machine has been purchased to allow patients to be scanned on the ward at a cost of £23k, saving unnecessary trips to other departments
• Magazines for the dayroom are now delivered monthly to ensure a constant supply of fresh reading matter for quiet times
• An Information Pack is being produced to offer new parents and patients on the wards easy access to all they need to know
• A new selection of bravery stickers and awards are now available for all our small soldiers!
Many of you may know Darren Bowler as a great friend of the Blandfords. He has now generously offered his time to help project manage and speed up the spending of the monies from the Christian Blandford Fund. Helping Darren in many different ways is Amy Hancox, whose daughter Anna is a former Pinckney patient, and who, along with her husband Matt, ran the London Marathon in April 2009 to raise funds. St George’s Hospital Charity is delighted to announce that both Darren and Amy have become official St George’s Hospital Volunteers and we are thrilled to have their dedicated input and enthusiasm.
February 2007
Christian had his kidney tumour removed there and recovered at their excellent PICU (Pediatric Intensive Care Unit). Since then he has had all his chemotherapy and radiotherapy at The Royal Marsden but has used St George's for emergencies. St George's is where we would drive to in the middle of the night if Christian spiked a temperature while Neutrapenic (no immune system), we usually went to the Pinkney Ward as there were individual rooms, vital for neutrapenic children. The level of comfort was a million miles from that at The Royal Marsden. The rooms had thin curtains so, in the summer, all the children would wake up very early in the morning. The parent slept on an old, uncomfortable sofa bed in the child's room.
We planned our original 10k run in 2006 to raise money to buy new sofa beds, curtains and blackout blinds. As we raised X more than the £10 000 needed, we were not only able to do this, we were also in a position to pay for a new treatment room, high chairs, medical cots, a new daycare room and a much-needed lick of paint.
Here is the letter from Frances Ward, the ward sister. Here is the letter from Peter Nutting, the accountant from the charitable foundation.
Here is the letter from Peter Nutting the accountant from the charitable foundation.
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