Pituitary Awareness Week takes place during the week of 20-26 September 2009. Lynda Lloyd, a volunteer for the Pituitary Foundation, has succeeded in securing a place on the plinth in Trafalgar Square to mark Pituitary Awareness Week. The plinth, the empty "Fourth Plinth" in Trafalgar Square, is currently a "living art monument" that will continue 24 hours a day for 100 days. Lynda will be on the plinth, wearing a Pituitary Foundation t-shirt, on Saturday, 26 September 2009 from 11:00 – 12:00. If you are in London or the surrounding area, please go to Trafalgar Square and give Lynda some support. For those of you not close to London, you can watch Lynda on the plinth live on the web at the link below.
There are plenty of other activities going on during Pituitary Awareness Week. For full details, visit the Pituitary Foundation website below.
Pituitary Awareness Week 2009
20th – 27th September
It’s our 15th Anniversary this year and we have decided to mark this milestone in a big way by letting people know who we are, what we do and what issues matter to our community. Our campaign this year is called:
15 Years - 15,000 Letters - £15,000
and it consists of two stages. Stage One is to send out Campaign Letters and Stage Two is aimed at raising funds.
Stage One – Campaign Letters
We need the pituitary community to band together and raise their voices (or lift their pens) to let the relevant people know the issues we face and what they can do to help us - so we’re asking you (and your partner, your family, your friends and your colleagues) to send campaign letters during Awareness Week to people who can make an immediate difference.
We have produced seven Campaign Letters to inform different people about important issues:
Pituitary Hydrocortisone Awareness – A&E
Pituitary Hydrocortisone Awareness – Ambulance Service
Promoting the Foundation - endocrinologists
Promoting the Foundation – endocrine nurses
Pituitary Disease Awareness – GPs
Pituitary Disease Awareness – Practice Nurses
Pituitary Disease Awareness - PCTs
All we are asking is for you to personalise the letters and send them to your GP, your GP practice nurse, your local PCT, your local A&E, your local ambulance service, your Endocrinologist, and your endocrine nurses.
Our aim is to send 15,000 letters and, once Awareness Week starts, we will be asking you all to let us know how many letters you have sent and we will publish a running total on our web site.
You will not be able to download the Campaign Letters until closer to the start of Awareness Week but you can download the Campaign Letters Guidelines now – this will enable you to plan your campaign and ensure that you mark the important dates on your calendar!
Download the Campaign Letter Guidelines.pdf (462 KB)
CAMPAIGN LETTERS CAN NOW BE DOWNLOADED !!
The seven Awareness Week Campaign Letters are now available for you to download. Please remember, do not send out any letters until the start of Awareness Week (20th September). Please send as many letters as you can and let us make this year's Awareness Week something special. Thank You.
Ambulance letter.doc (23.00 KB)
Endo Nurse letter.doc (29.00 KB)
Endocrinologists letter.doc (28.50 KB)
Practice Nurse letter.doc (28.00 KB)
Stage Two – Organising Events to Raise Funds
Following the success last year of the Strawberry Line Walk (the walk between Yatton and Cheddar) we are organising it again this year but we really want to encourage you to organise local events to raise money for The Foundation – our target is £15,000.
Walks already arranged:
- The 3rd Annual Strawberry Line Walk (this year, Yatton to Winscombe) – 26 September. Registration and Sponsor Forms are now available to download - please click here.
- Cambridge Walk – Sunday 20th September (see Cambridge Group page for details)
- Derby/Nottingham Walk – Date TBC
- Aberdeen Walk – 20th September
- Liverpool - Walk Around Albert Dock on Liverpool Waterfront - Saturday 26th September
- Central Lancs - a 3-mile walk starting at Glasson Dock and ending with a pub lunch! Saturday 19th September at 10.30am
- Aberdeen - Duthie Park, Sunday 20th September (click here for full details)
- Cardiff - a sponsored walk from Penarth to Cosmeston Park Lakes on Saturday September 26th. Walk between half to 3.5 miles. (Click here for more details)
We need you to do something in your local area
We aren’t asking for your walk to be 25 miles with 200 people participating – you can walk as far as you want with as many (or few) people as can do it with you. Last year, the Salisbury Group organised a short, easy walk around a local landmark (Old Sarum Castle) and ten walkers raised £2000 between them – if every group could do something like this, we would easily exceed our £15,000 target!
Just get sponsorship to do it (and see if your employer will match it) and let your local paper know what you’re doing and why.
Not into walking?
Then swim, bike, climb, have a coffee morning, hold a quiz, ask friends to dinner but make them pay a tenner – do anything to raise cash and get the word ‘pituitary’ out and about as far as you can.
Be creative!
Not into asking for money? Then do something like what the Sussex County Local Pituitary Support Group is doing. They’ve booked awareness days (five of them!) at local shopping centres where they’ll be displaying leaflets and information and having a draw to ‘Name the Lion’ (winner gets the soft toy lion that’s been named).
We’ll provide you with sponsorship forms, example press releases and t-shirts!
[certain conditions apply for t-shirts – see the downloadable guidelines]
Download the Event Guidelines.pdf (545 KB)
Download the Sponsor Form.pdf (472 KB)
Please let us know what you’re doing so we can inform others how they can support you and we can monitor the impact our community is making!
Donations
We have created a dedicated page on the JustGiving website where you can make donations to the Awareness Week campaign (please enter on the Comment line the person/event you are sponsoring). The 'money thermometer' on the page will let eveyone keep track of the money raised so far. Simply click on the £ button to go to the JustGiving web page:
Don’t ask what The Foundation can do for you…
…do something for yourself and get involved!
Together, we can make a statement, far and wide, loud and clear, to help you along your journey but also to help those who will be diagnosed in the years to come to have a better experience.
For more information or if you are planning a walk or other event:
e-mail helpline@pituitary.org.uk or phone 0845 450 0376.
To get your campaign letter pack, send an A5 SAE with two second class stamps to:
The Pituitary Foundation
15 Years – 15,000 Letters - £15,000
PO Box 1944
Bristol
BS99 2UB
[please note, we cannot send campaign packs without an SAE]
Endocrine Nurse Help Line - extra hours during Awareness Week
We are very pleased to announce that our endocrine nurse, Alison Milne, has offered to provide extended cover as her contribution to Awareness Week - well done Alison, many thanks!
The Nurse Help Line hours during Awareness Week will be:
- Monday 21st - 10am to 12noon; evening cover as normal
- Tuesday 22nd - 10am to 12noon
- Wednesday 23rd - 10am to 12noon
- Thursday 24th - 9am to 1pm (normal cover)
- Friday 25th - 10am to 12noon
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