Maggie's Cancer Caring Centres
Free entry
Many more people are now surviving cancer due to better prevention and treatment, which is good news. However, there is an increasing population of people living with cancer as a chronic illness and experiencing all the challenges this brings.
Over two million people in the UK are living with cancer – a figure increasing by 3% every year. With one in three people expected to develop it over the course of their lives, cancer affects almost every family in the country. We want to expand our network of centres to provide support for every family that needs it.
Our centres are places where we help people to find their own way forward. We particularly focus on the common feeling of helplessness, loss of control and isolation that many people affected by cancer experience. Supporting people to work through these challenging emotions can help them to face the other physical and life changing consequences cancer can bring.
The NHS provides excellent cancer treatment but people with cancer, and their families and friends, need more than treatment, diagnosis and prognosis. They need help with the emotional, psychological and practical side-effects of the disease. They need the opportunity to meet others facing cancer and, together, to take control of their own wellbeing. At Maggie's this support is provided within an open, easily accessible, architecturally inspiring, community centre which acts as an antidote to the isolation and despair of a cancer diagnosis. In a nutshell, Maggie's helps visitors to have the best life possible with, through and beyond cancer.
Mary McCartney's portrait for Maggie's
In May 2010 Mary McCartney took a series of portraits of people who had used or are still using Maggie's Cancer Caring Centres. Each person was captured with the object or person that has helped them through their cancer experience.
The portraits offer a glimpse into the relationships that support and give strength to people, even through the fear and isolation that a cancer diagnosis can bring. They are bold, yet serene, capturing strength, determination and joy: the joy that can still be had in living, even alongside the fear of dying.
A number of the portraits and interviews with their subjects were featured in The Times Body and Soul section on 18 May 2010.
