Patient support group

Kidney cancer patient support group

The kidney cancer patient support group started on 5 November 2014 to help support patients with renal cancer outside of clinical areas.

A support group can be of great benefit to patients, helping to increase knowledge of kidney cancer and allowing patients to share their experiences with each other.

Please contact us directly if you wish to become a member and receive information about the support group by post or email. We are very keen for members to take a more active role in the management of the support group so if you are interested in becoming more involved, please contact us on 020 7317 7779 or rfh.renalcancernursing@nhs.net.

Support group meetings

To date, the kidney cancer patient support group has met twice. Our last meeting took place on Wednesday 11 February 2015 when two specialist guest speakers were invited to present at the meeting. Mr Illing, consultant interventional radiologist, presented on cryotherapy and its use as a treatment for renal cancer. Mr Keith Hunt MBE, complementary therapist, presented on the development of the complementary therapies service at the Royal Free London and discussed some of the many benefits to patients. The session was attended by 15 patients and relatives, Mr Aitchison, director renal cancer services and consultant urologist, Mr Mumtaz, consultant urologist and Mr Al-Akraa, consultant urologist and David Cullen and Nicola Rode from the clinical nurse specialist team.

At our first meeting in November 2014 David Cullen, clinical nurse specialist, introduced the group, discussed the set up and agreed ground rules. The group agreed to meet every 8-12 weeks and ask two specialist speakers to present for 30 minutes; one on medicine and one on complementary therapies.

Elaine Heywood, MacmIllan counsellor at the Royal Free Hospital, addressed the group to discuss how a support group can help to address the ‘living with and beyond cancer’ agenda.