High-profile cancer awareness campaign by Dundee students

Let’s Talk About Mouth Cancer charity spreads message in communities and at Holyrood

07 February, 2018 / infocus
 

Scottish charity Let’s Talk About Mouth Cancer returned to partner with students from University of Dundee Dental School for Mouth Cancer Action Month in November 2017.

Building on successful collaborations in recent years, the campaign reached further and wider into the community this November.

After intensive tutorials and campaign design, the teams of final-year students and core trainees, instilled with their newly gained confidence and knowledge about mouth cancer, went out to meet identified high-risk groups.

These included ethnic minority women at the Dundee International Women’s Centre, homeless people at an afternoon church drop-in session and care workers at local residential elderly care homes. The teams imparted the skills and knowledge to empower these target groups to identify common early signs and symptoms of mouth cancer in their own mouths and those of care home residents.

On Thursday 16 November, a small team travelled to the Scottish Parliament where, joined by charity patron Scott Hastings, they lobbied and impressed upon MSPs the urgent challenge that mouth cancer presents, and explained how simple risk reduction and early detection by mouth self-examination can save lives. Additionally, the pressure for gender-neutral HPV vaccination was further applied to parliamentarians.

 

Inside Holyrood: (l-r) Miles Briggs MSP, Emma Findlay and Yasmine Coll

An evening CPD lecture ‘What Am I Looking At?’ hosted by the BDA Dundee and Perth Section saw charity trustees cover early detection and referral for mouth cancer. This was again emphasised by the live interview with local man Ian Rankin whose wife Jeni recently lost
her fight against mouth cancer.

In addition, the Dundee Dental Students Society held lunchtime stalls on the university campus to reach out to other young people who are one of the fastest growing groups to be affected by mouth cancer. Then they raised £674 for the charity through an “Oral Cancer” pub quiz and later an acoustic night.

The charity has ambitious plans for 2018 – CPD lectures, further undergraduate teaching and other public engagement events are
being prepared.

MORE INFORMATION

For more information
please see www.ltamc.org

Tags: Cancer Awareness / Mouth Cancer

Categories: News

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