Do something amazing for Brain Tumour Awareness Month

This month is Brain Tumour Awareness Month and members of the Worcestershire Brain Tumour Support Group (WBTSG) will also be continuing to do their bit, and hopefully helping to promote the work that they do with children and families throughout the region.

Life stories:

Sharon Sambrook and her son Ben from Walsall - Three years ago Ben was diagnosed with a malignant brain tumour; a grade 4 glioma, and given little hope for survival. But now aged 10, he has defied the odds. After extensive surgery, and many months of chemotherapy and radiotherapy, Ben’s doing well, including being selected for the top maths class at school. He enjoys football and cycling, and on top of that, in honour of his courage in battling through it all, Ben was awarded a Local Heroes Award for his determination and in recognition of his mum Sharon’s extraordinary fundraising efforts. Sharon, decided to turn Ben’s situation into something positive, and in the past two and a half years, via the Ben Sambrook Trust, has raised an amazing £70,000 for the Samantha Dickson Brain Tumour Trust to help fund a three year project into gliomas, the type of tumour Ben had.

Today an active member of the WBTSG, Sharon is also keen to promote the importance and value of support groups such as WBTSG, having found help in talking to other parents facing similar situations to the one she and her family found themselves in: "Our friends just couldn’t possibly understand what we were going through so I surrounded myself with strangers that did."

Another active WBTSG member, Gill Richardson, over the winter months has been busy organising and selling WBTSG promotional gifts, stating the support and friendship from the group as being instrumental in helping her and her family cope with her diagnosis of a brain meningioma. Together with her younger daughter Laura, Gill continues to raise funds for WBTSG so that other families like hers can gain the support they so desperately need.

With greater research into brain tumours needed, the WBTSG is a valuable local source of information and support for individuals and families across the area. For more information about the work of the WBTSG or brain tumour issues in general, please contact the WBTSG on 0780 4820351 or visit their website: www.wbtsg.org or email: info@wbtsg.org

Further details aboutBrain Tumour Awareness Month visit: www.braintumouruk.org.uk or call 0845 4500 386

Brain Tumour Statistics:

• More children now die from a brain tumour than any other childhood cancer.
• Sadly 3,400 people lose their lives to a brain tumour each year.
• Whilst on average 75% of all childhood cancer patients in Britain survive five years, only 65% of children diagnosed with a high grade brain tumour live for longer than this.
• In adults, with a malignant brain tumour, the statistic is even more tragic with only 14% living longer than 5 years.
• 40% of all cancer deaths in children are from a brain tumour.
• The number of people dying from a brain tumour has increased over the last decade - incidence increases by approximately 2% per year.
• 6,500 people are diagnosed each year with a primary brain tumour.
• On average it takes longer to diagnose a child with a brain tumour in the UK than in North America and a number of European countries. The principal cause of delay in diagnosis is the failure by front-line health professionals to include brain tumours in the differential diagnosis.
• The average years of life lost (AYLL) to brain tumours is the highest of any cancer at over 20 years.

*(Source The Samantha Dickson Brain Tumour Trust - www.braintumourtrust.co.uk)

Contact Details:

Worcestershire Brain Tumour Support Group

Tel: 0780 4820351

Email: info@wbtsg.org

www.wbtsg.org

12/03/2010