FUNDRAISING worth £5020 for cancer treatment was recognised in a ceremony on Tuesday 28th June at Dumfries and Galloway Royal Infirmary.
John and Rosemary Wood, who live in Dalbeattie, raised the money over four years through car boot sales at Dumfries Rugby Football Club ground, and donated it to the head and neck fund at DGRI, as well as to Glasgow’s Queen Elizabeth University Hospital and Macmillan Cancer Support.
The fundraising followed Rosemary’s successful treatment and recovery from cancer, supported by DGRI, the Queen Elizabeth and the Macmillan nurses.
The latest cheque, for £500, was handed over this week to staff at DGRI, who also unveiled the hospital’s new end of treatment bell, engraved as a tribute to John and Rosemary Wood’s work.
The bell is intended to be rung by people who have completed a course of cancer treatment, and again when they have completed five years in remission.
Rosemary Wood said: “We would like to thank all our family and our neighbours and good friends, who all contributed items to the sales and supported us in many ways. Quite often people would come to one of our sales and give us money and then say ‘no, I don’t want anything, that’s a donation’. A lot of people have been touched by cancer, and this was just our way of saying thank you for all the support and care we received.”
John Wood said: “Our daughter Lesley in particular donated a lot of jewellery to us, and with other jewellery and ornaments which we inherited from other relatives we were able to raise over £2000 just in the first 18 months. I was a jeweller, so I was able to repair and restore a lot of the goods, and then we were able to sell them.”
Nick Mitchell, charity operational manager of the Dumfries and Galloway Health Board Endowment Fund, received the cheque on behalf of the fund.
Nick Mitchell said: “The Fund is hugely grateful for this donation, and for all the support that John and Rosemary have given over the last four years. As Rosemary said, cancer affects many, many people in Dumfries and Galloway – people who have it, their relatives and their friends, and those who care for them. Donations like this allow staff at DGRI and across the Health and Social Care Partnership to provide the best care they can to everyone affected.”
