What We Do

It would be so lovely just to have some time out, away from this illness, hospital appointments and treatment.” Karen

At 4 Cancer we understand this feeling. When you are living with cancer, whether you are a patient or a carer, undergoing treatment or even in remission, everything seems somehow to focus on the illness. Just a day doing something different, being yourself again, feeling ‘normal’, can leave you feeling refreshed and revitalised.

When you have also tried something new and exciting it can be a huge boost to your confidence. It is for these reasons that we provide cancer patients and their families, carers and those recently bereaved with a wide range of activities to try.

Our respite programme for this year will offer plenty of opportunities for people living with cancer to spend some quality time with their families, away from the stresses of living with a cancer diagnosis. Everything we do is focusing on creating lasting memories…

Days Out

When family life has been taken over by hospital appointments and treatment schedules, it’s good to take some time off and enjoy a proper family day out.

Our days out for all the family can take many forms. We offer a wide range of  respite days which offer families a unique opportunity to relax and unwind whilst learning new skills. Many of our days out are alpine focused!

From indoor snow centre days to a cable car trip at Nevis Range ski resort for lunch at the top of the mountain, our days out are guaranteed to keep families  grinning from ear to ear!

So why not visit the respite division of our charity (4 Cancer) to find out more about our days out and to look at our schedule for the next few months. Alternatively, why not nominate someone in need!

Short Breaks

Every year, we are able to offer a number of short breaks and longer holidays for families living with cancer, enabling people to break away from everyday life and try something new and different!

Our holiday portfolio is varied and the type of breaks we are able to offer changes regularly depending on both available funding but also the respite partners we have commercial agreements in place with at the time. Find our more about our short breaks here >

We have already received a large volume of nominations for this year and unfortunately are restricted to the number of holidays we can offer. However please do still place your nomination; the nominee will be placed on a waiting list and we will contact them as soon as possible. If the nomination is urgent please specify this on the form and explain why.

Research

Most cancer research charities are focused on finding cures which will benefit cancer patients in the future. Our research focus is a little different. The ‘4 Cancer Group’ is all about helping people who are going through treatment now. Our focus is on helping families ‘here and now’.

Consequently, our principal research focus is to quantify the impact of the charity’s various respite programmes. We want to make sure that our beneficiary families derive maximum benefit from the days out and holidays which we arrange for them.

Given that exercise is a major factor in both cancer prevention and recovery, we are also interested in the extent to which keep an active lifestyle can benefit the people we are trying to help.

This is why so many of our days out and short breaks encourage people to ‘get active’. Find out more about our research activities here >