Treating more than 44,000 patients each year, 26% of our patients are referred here from hospitals across the UK. Every year, there are more than 6,500 patient journeys from the East Cheshire area which fall beyond the recommended travel time.
For those patients who live furthest away, coming to The Christie can mean a journey time of two hours or more. This puts tremendous pressure on them and their families at a time when they are already dealing with emotional stress of a cancer diagnosis.
“The standard of care from The Christie has been exceptional. I knew I was in the best place for my treatment, but having to travel so far was very disruptive. It meant I was not able to get home in time for school runs.”
- Gemma Ellis, Christie patient from Chapel-en-le-Frith in Derbyshire
Our vision for our patients
What patients need and deserve is first-class treatment and care from Christie experts, closer to home. This helps to enhance their patient experience and still ensures the best clinical outcomes.
In recent years, this aim has been achieved through the opening of our two treatment centres in Oldham and Salford, our mobile chemotherapy unit and our Christie at home service.
Thanks to the incredible success of these services, we are delighted to announce our exciting plan to open a new Christie cancer centre in Macclesfield.
The new centre will transform cancer care in East Cheshire, bringing together essential cancer services into one purpose-built unit delivering local specialist access to radiotherapy, chemotherapy, holistic support and information services, outpatient care and palliative care.
It will also bring early phase clinical trials to East Cheshire for the first time. This means patients in the local area will be among the first in the country to access new treatments as they become available.
The new centre will be home to two linear accelerators – highly specialist equipment which will deliver more than 15,000 radiotherapy treatments every year. There will be 18 treatment chairs to deliver more than 4,000 chemotherapy treatments a year.
It will be staffed by Christie doctors, nurses and other specialists, ensuring all patients get the very best Christie care – just nearer to home.
“Whilst patients and families are prepared to travel to The Christie for specialist services, we also understand that in reality many would prefer to have those services locally where possible. It saves valuable time and money and can make a difficult time much easier.”
- Dr Andrew Sykes, consultant clinical oncologist at The Christie
How you can help
Your donations in support of this project will not only save patients time and money on fuel costs and fares. It will also mean that patients are free to spend more time doing the things they love.
Work on the two storey building is expected to start later in 2019, with the aim of opening in summer 2021.
Click here to donate now
