Cancer awareness session – informative, open and focused

Cancer Awareness session at the Multicultural Arts and Media Centre

A cancer awareness session delivered by Claire Rogers, Sarah West and Martin Williams from NHS Greater Manchester, Lancashire and South Cumbria Strategic Clinical Networks (NHS GMLSC SCN) and Mohammed Sarwar, Multicultural Arts and Media Centre on Arts and Health, was declared ‘informative, open and focused on what cancer is all about’.

The guest speaker included Dr. Chris Duffy, Chair of NHS Heywood, Middleton and Rochdale Clinical Commissioning Group, on Let’s Talk Cancer providing vital information, support and treatments available. He provided the opportunity for questions from the audience.

Dr. Duffy said: “It is great to see so many people turn up today, where we can get information across, what you can do yourself and how to improve things.”

Patricia McDonald from Rochdale Circle said: “It’s been really interesting what we talked about. We have been able to do questions and answers and I was impressed that Doctor Duffy was able to come out and chat with us.”

Elaine Grace from Healthwatch Rochdale said: “From the engagement side, the message for me today is, that there are barriers to working with the Black and Minority Ethnic (BME) Community. We need to engage with them and the translations can definitely help.”

Councillor Billy Sheerin said: “The session has been so informative and so open and focused on what cancer is all about. Good feedback from NHS and Doctor Duffy provided a statistical rundown of what the problems are of cancer. Cancer is treatable now and we need to educate people, the mixture from all ethnic backgrounds has been amazing.”

Mohammed said: “The awareness of cancer signs and symptoms is very important within our communities and encourage people to see their GP at the earliest. We need to provide awareness of health issues on regular basis with appropriate resources, translated materials and supported by health professionals”.

MAMC has been providing various opportunities over the years to support patients, carers and member of the public to gain knowledge of health issues by engaging with the arts.

Mohammed said: “Our borough has a rich cultural diversity and arts for health can play an important role in social integration, improving health and wellbeing, the development of talent and innovation”.

The Cancer Awareness session was organised by the Multicultural Arts and Media Centre for the community on Tuesday 26 May at MAMC in association with Greater Manchester, Lancashire and South Cumbria Strategic Clinical Network, HMR Clinical Commissioning Group and Link4Life.

The event was attended by 49 people from all communities, including organisations, Healthwatch Rochdale, Springhill Hospice, Oldham Adult Service, Big Life Centre (Living Well), Macmillan, HomeInstead, Deeplish All Women Network, Healthy Minds, Gateway Leisure, Rochdale Circle, Khubsurat House and Young people.

The session helped to recruit 20 people to be trained as Cancer Champions which will be provided on 16 June at MAMC.