Pancreatic Cancer UK

As it's a new year, let's get serious for just a moment. Although I appreciate that I am one of the lucky ones who get a place in the London Marathon through the ballot, which allows me just to run for myself if I should so wish (and believe me that's a big enough challenge), that seems to me to be a little bit selfish, so why not use my personal challenge to help others? I have therefore offered to run for Pancreatic Cancer UK, as this was the disease that took my lovely Mum from us over six years ago now. 

Before we were so devastated by it, we knew very little about this form of the disease, despite the fact that it is the most fatal of all cancers in the UK, with only 3% of patients surviving for 5 years or more – something which hasn’t changed in the last 40 years. Part of the problem is that it presents with a whole range of diverse, non-specific symptoms, meaning that diagnosis is very difficult and far too many people are only diagnosed when it is too late to make any difference to their chances of survival. This was indeed the case with Mum - for some time after she began to feel poorly she was treated for diabetes, and it was only when she failed to get better and further tests revealed secondary tumours in her liver that the real cause of her illness was diagnosed. By this time though, it was too late for her and she died just three short months later, at the age of just 66.

Pancreatic Cancer UK is the only national charity in the UK dedicated to combating this form of the disease on all fronts: information, support, campaigning and research. It aims to improve knowledge and awareness of pancreatic cancer in the hope of improving diagnosis and survival rates. I have set up a sponsorship page and would be so grateful if you could give just a little, to inspire me with the challenge I have set myself and to help this very worthy cause. Thank you.

http://www.justgiving.com/Sacha-Farley