"Difficult decision" - Derbyshire cancer recovery group to close after funding axed

The group, which helps those going through cancer treatment, started up in 2017 following a collaboration between Derby County Community Trust (DCCT) and University Hospitals of Derby and Burton Trust (UHDBT).

It hosts a number of sessions aimed at helping members regain confidence, fitness and strength: the sessions are free for a year and designed to improve key areas impacted by specific cancers.

Joined Up Care Derby and Derbyshire, which assists with the distribution of funding, said the source used for funds was no longer available.

Roy Ingham, 57 and a former NHS worker, said the group was like nothing he had ever experienced before.

“I have only been involved for a couple of weeks but when I got to it they said they had lost the funding. It’s absolutely crazy, it’s a real gutter: I only moved from Surrey about eight months ago and there’s nothing like this down there”, he explained.

A spokesperson for Joined Up Care Derby and Derbyshire said: “The rehabilitation service at Chesterfield and Derby has been provided using a funding source that is unfortunately now no longer available.

"The Derby and Derbyshire Cancer Board has therefore had to make the difficult decision to end the current scheme that is provided by Derby County Community Trust and Burton Albion Community Trust.

"We will now use patient feedback and engagement as part of a review of the best way to provide rehabilitation services for cancer patients across the whole of Derby and Derbyshire."

Mr Ingham said: "I’m a leukaemia patient in remission and chemo can really take it out of you, the fatigue can be incredible but these groups, even if it's just a little bit of exercise, really help. It’s not the football club or the hospital’s fault that there’s no funding but I just thought we needed to get something out there in case anyone else is able to step up and help fund the group.”

A spokesperson for Derbyshire County Community Trust explained that, as the delivery partner for the project, they access external funding to provide the service and that, as a charity themselves, they are simply unable to ‘sustain the delivery without this funding’.