Marie Curie and UCL to establish new Chair in Palliative and End of Life Care
Press release published
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Marie Curie and University College London (UCL) School of Life & Medical Sciences are pleased to announce the establishment of the first Chair of Palliative and End of Life Care at UCL, following a £3.2 million grant from the UK’s leading end of life care charity. The Chair will lead an established team of researchers in the Marie Curie Palliative Care Research Unit (MCPCRU) in the Mental Health Sciences Unit, UCL Faculty of Brain Sciences. It is a world leading centre of excellence in palliative and end of life care research for those with advanced progressive life limiting illnesses, such as dementia. The MCPCRU is multi-disciplinary and includes experts in palliative medicine, old age psychiatry, health psychology, nursing, systematic review methodology, health economics and statistics. The unit receives core funding from Marie Curie and matches this income with external grants. The Marie Curie grant will also support a non-clinical lectureship and a number of studentships. Dr Jane Collins, Chief Executive of Marie Curie, said: “Despite the fact that death and dying affects everyone, palliative and end of life care is seriously under-researched because research is under-funded in the UK. We believe the establishment of a new Chair in Palliative and End of Life Care at UCL will help improve our understanding of how we should care for people with advanced progressive life limiting illnesses, as well as encourage greater research collaborations across the UK and more widely.” Professor Alan Thompson, Dean of Faculty of Brain Sciences sad: “This exciting development will enable the Faculty of Brain Sciences to build on the pioneering research of the Marie Curie Palliative Care Research Unit and make further significant impact for patients, carers and their families.” Recruitment for the chair is open until Friday, 2nd August 2013 -ENDS- |
Contact information
Tracy Barrett
Senior Media, PR and Campaigns Manager
- 0207 599 7292
- Out of hours: 0845 073 8699
- tracy.barrett@mariecurie.org.uk
Updated
Notes to editor
Marie Curie is one of the UK’s largest charities. Employing more than 2,700 nurses, doctors and other healthcare professionals, it provided care to more than 35,000 terminally ill patients in the community and in its nine hospices last year and is the largest provider of hospice beds outside the NHS.
Funding
Around 70 per cent of the charity’s income comes from the generous support of thousands of individuals, membership organisations and businesses, with the balance of our funds coming from the NHS.
Marie Curie Nurses
The charity is best known for its network of Marie Curie Nurses working in the community to provide end of life care, totally free for patients in their own homes.
Research
The charity provides core funding for three palliative care research facilities; the Marie Curie Palliative Care Research Unit at University College London, the Marie Curie Palliative Care Institute Liverpool and the Marie Curie Palliative Care Centre at the Wales Cancer Trials Unit (Cardiff University). The charity also supports palliative and end of life care research through its project grant funding streams, the Marie Curie Cancer Care Research Programme (administered by Cancer Research UK) and the Dimbleby Marie Curie Cancer Care Research Fund. Both research programmes aims to tackle the funding and knowledge gap in palliative and end of life care research, which in turn will benefit patients, families and carers.
The right to die in place of choice
Marie Curie Cancer Care has been campaigning for more patients to be able to make the choice to be cared for and die in their place of choice.