Louth 'shave night' for cancer service

 ‘Bairey Hikers’: Paul Dromgoole, Mark Dromgoole and Jason Hoey

Nurses at St. James’s were delighted during April to welcome back popular former patient Mark Dromgoole from Castlebellingham in Co Louth. Mark came with his friends to present a cheque for €8,000 for the benefit of the hospital’s cancer service. The funds had been raised through a sponsored ‘shave night’ held in December 2010. The group – who called themselves ‘The Bairey Hiker Team’ – had spent November growing head and facial hair in time for the shave night.

The Bairey Hiker Team comprised 18 members of St Joseph’s GAA Club, Dromiskin, plus three more friends. Mark was accompanied to the hospital by his brother Paul and close friend, Jason Hoey. They were welcomed to the hospital by Mark’s former palliative care nurse, Catriona Corcoran, and by Karen Boyle, Nurse Manager of the hospital’s Walter Stevenson Ward.

Karen, who is the nurse manager of the hospital’s Walter Stevenson Ward, said how deeply grateful they were to receive these additional funds: “We use these donated funds for those extra things that we could never buy from the current hospital expenditure – those things that are nice to have for patients but not absolutely necessary.” ‘Electric beds’ are what she said they really wanted for all patients now. She added that the positive feedback meant a lot: “We don’t expect to hear from patients but when we do it really feels good – all the staff will be so pleased by this gift.”

St. James’s is the largest single provider of cancer treatment in Ireland and selected as the largest national centre of radiotherapy service. A major new government funded Cancer Care Centre and Radiation Oncology Centre has now been equipped at the site and a facility for PET imaging for advanced patient diagnosis has been installed – the first such facility within a public hospital in Ireland.

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St. James’s Hospital Foundation
St. James’s Hospital
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Dublin 8

Telephone 01 428 4086
Email foundation@stjames.ie