Who else we help

Who else we help

Whilst the focus of our activities will always be in providing emotional and physical support to cancer patients and their families, we have been approached in recent years to provide a tailored and modified service to patients with long term conditions, specifically Motor Neurone Disease. We are proud to be recognised for the positive impact our services have in supporting these patients and their families and we are funded externally to deliver therapeutic services specifically to these patients.

Cavendish Cancer Care working with Motor Neurone Disease

Since 2009 Cavendish Cancer Care has been providing a supportive care service for patients with Motor Neurone Disease (MND) and their main carer. This is funded by the South Yorkshire Motor Neurone Disease Association and we work in partnership with both them and the MND team at The Royal Hallamshire Hospital. The main aim of this service is to increase the provision of emotional, psychological and physical support for patients and to offer the same care to those who are caring for the patients. As many patients are too unwell to attend our main centre on Wilkinson Street, we have provided our service mainly in the home. We provided our full model of care; assessment, up to four hour-long sessions, of a chosen complementary therapy and review. In contrast to the ‘pulses’ of need more apparent with a diagnosis of cancer, we were aware that people with MND often have ongoing and a more rapid increase in need for support and for many, over a shorter time period.

The review of the service received indicates some of the complexity of providing support for people with MND, which for most is a progressively deteriorating condition, and equally the complexity of need for their carers. The value of the service to patients and carers has been endorsed by those who chose to continue sessions after the inital course of sessions has been completed.

This work has been funded by South Yorkshire Motor Neurone Disease Association