How You Can Help
- Simply book your next holiday with Charitable Travel and tell us you want to support UCARE. The charity will then benefit from the free donation you can make as part of the booking process. To read more about how this works, head to our ‘About us‘ page.
- If you want to make a donation to UCARE and you are not booking a holiday, click here to visit their website.
- Visit ucare-oxford.org.uk to sign up to newsletters, and follow the UCARE social media pages, and help spread the word.
How You Can Help
How You Can Help
- Simply book your next holiday with Charitable Travel and tell us you want to support UCARE. The charity will then benefit from the free donation you can make as part of the booking process. To read more about how this works, head to our ‘About us‘ page.
- If you want to make a donation to UCARE and you are not booking a holiday, click here to visit their website.
- Visit ucare-oxford.org.uk to sign up to newsletters, and follow the UCARE social media pages, and help spread the word.
- Simply book your next holiday with Charitable Travel and tell us you want to support UCARE. The charity will then benefit from the free donation you can make as part of the booking process. To read more about how this works, head to our ‘About us‘ page.
- If you want to make a donation to UCARE and you are not booking a holiday, click here to visit their website.
- Visit ucare-oxford.org.uk to sign up to newsletters, and follow the UCARE social media pages, and help spread the word.
UCARE (Urology Cancer Research and Education) is an Oxford based charity committed to improving the treatment and care of cancer patients through research and education.
UCARE was founded by doctors, patients, and a dedicated committee in 2007. Pushing this forward was David Cranston a Professor in Surgery and Consultant Urological Surgeon, and Andrew Protheroe, a Professor in Medical Oncology. They were alarmed by the legacy of under-funded research into urological cancers in comparison to some other cancer types; when 20% of all newly diagnosed cancers would be one of the urological cancers. They came to the conclusion that the only way to alleviate this problem of funding research in Oxford was to start a new charity.
In September 2007 UCARE was registered with the Charity Commission, our remit to support research into the causes, prevention and treatment of urological cancers and to promote the development of new technologies to improve diagnosis and treatment for cancer patients.
Our charitable objects, visions, and aims
- To support research into the causes, prevention and treatment of urological cancers and related conditions.
- To promote the development of new technologies that will help to improve the diagnosis and treatment of urological cancers and related conditions.
- To provide equipment and facilities for research, and for the treatment of cancer patients.
- To provide information and education about urological cancers.
A few years on
Although we are a small charity in terms of staffing; we are experienced and established enough to be able to make a difference in the fight against urological cancer, but small enough to be able to ensure that we are personally involved with all of the day to day running of the charity. Donations do not simply get swallowed up, we ensure they are used for the projects the donor is interested in, we ensure that supporters are valued as part of our team and that we are available to personally help with any fundraising projects. Decisions on what research to fund are made according to national guidelines, but unlike larger national charities, we can deploy funding quickly and in highly targeted ways, to support research within Oxford’s renown medical centre of excellence.
Funding research
We aim to fund the best quality research by bringing together the knowledge and opinions of researchers, clinicians and allied professionals to make decisions and support research and education in urological cancers. Currently, we are supporting small or pump-priming grants which provide an opportunity for young researchers, academics and clinicians to develop their research experience in addressing important and specific questions relevant to urological cancers. Funding for these projects that are in the early stages of development and which facilitate the collection of pilot data can be difficult for young researchers to get. Their collection of data and initial findings would ideally form the basis for high quality competitive applications for further support and research.
However, we have over the years funded much bigger projects which you can see from our funding archives on our website and always open to applications from researchers. Apart from making grants for research we work with health professionals in uro-oncology within the Oxford University Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust for patients who are referred to this cancer centre of excellence.
Raising awareness
One thing was very clear; alongside research we needed to bring greater awareness of these cancers and support those with the disease and their families. Urological cancers, those of the kidney, bladder, prostate and testes are frequently diagnosed and account for 1 in 3 of all cancers in men and 1 in 5 of all cancers in men and women. 50,000 urological cancers are diagnosed every year in the UK, and in any year, across the country, they cause 18,000 deaths. Yet they still have a low public profile, resulting in symptoms not being recognised, not being taken seriously or simply going unreported because of embarrassment or fear, we are trying to challenge this understanding to bring people forward sooner for diagnosis and treatment.
UCARE offer a free service to businesses, clubs, schools etc. We offer you the chance to have UCARE provide a programme to support Health and Well Being. This is a priority for workplaces and is now increasingly more important. Businesses need to be thinking about the health and wellbeing of their staff and how best to support them. Since we have been unable to get out in the community to offer many of our services we are looking at ways to transfer this to the internet. We also hope that local businesses can choose UCARE to support as their charity of the year. Many sports clubs, businesses and social networking groups choose to support a charity each year. By nominating UCARE they raise vital funding for our work and generate a greater awareness of urological cancers within their group. Choosing to support UCARE they can be assured that they are not number on a data base but a part of our team in the battle against urological cancer.
Get in touch
Urology Cancer Research and Education UCARE (Oxford) is a registered charity, no 1120887.
by net effect