Be Cancer Aware

Be Cancer Aware is a co-production project that works with experts by experience from across the North East and Cumbria.

Together we deliver education and training to the learning disability community and support campaigns raising awareness of cancer.

On 28th September 2022 we were proud to be recognised by the Patient Engagement Network National Awards (PENNA). Achieving runners up in the category “Cancer Experience of Care” and winners in the category “Engaging and Championing the public”.

Find out more about our entry and project

 

 

Why is Be Cancer Aware important
From the Confidential Enquiry into Premature Deaths of People with Learning Disability and LeDeR (Learning from Deaths review) reports we know:

For people with a learning disability, cancer is often diagnosed at a late stage, with concerns of diagnostic overshadowing and a lack of reasonable adjustments to support diagnosis and treatment.

There are significantly lower uptake rates across all screening programmes.

Those with a diagnosis of cancer are less likely to be informed of their diagnosis and prognosis, be involved in decisions about their care, be given pain relief or receive palliative care.

Our Current Campaign
Our current Campaign is about “Going to the GP”.

We have developed videos and top tips for people with a learning disability to help them get the most out of face to face, telephone or video appointments.

We have also developed an editable template for GP practices to use describing how to make an appointment at the GP practice. This can be edited using the photobank.

Contact julie.tucker11@nhs.net to find out more