Adam Evans-Thomas

The achievements of Adam's Bucketful of Hope Appeal Pembrokeshire born Adam Evans-Thomas died in February 2004 following a ten-year battle with leukaemia. During those ten years Adam campaigned tirelessly for cancer sufferers like himself. Four years later his legacy is still being felt across Wales.

Adam needed a bone marrow transplant to prolong his life, but unfortunately had a very rare tissue type. Instead of accepting his fate he decided to go out and find donors, raising £45,000 for the testing of over 3.000 potential donors. Nineteen of these went on to be successful matches for patients with leukaemia.

Sadly Adam didn't live to see the culmination of this work, Adam's Festival of Hope. It was the largest charity event ever to be held in Pembrokeshire, recruiting 250 new bone marrow donors, putting Pembrokeshire into the Guinness Book of Records and publicising the need for donors worldwide.

Throughout his illness Adam's treatment was split between his local hospital, Withybush General, and Cardiff's University of Wales Hospital. His mother praised both, commenting that all his medical attention was given "with the utmost of care and professionalism by the staff and doctors alike."

By the time he died Adam had started an appeal to thank the hospitals that had given him so much during his illness. His aim was to build a special new room on the transplant ward in Cardiff and a cancer day unit with state-of-the-art facilities at Withybush. His consultant at the time was Dr Najma Saleem. One of her patients remarked that "she gave a thimbleful of bad news in a bucketful of hope," and so the name of the appeal was born.

On July 16th 2005 The Festival of Hope Day raised £54,000 which, along with £9,000 Adam had already raised, kick-started the appeal in earnest. The day was supported by a long list of celebrities including Brian May, Stuart Cable, Simon Weston, the Cheeky Girls and Boney M.

Just before Christmas 2007 a group of the appeal's committee members and patient representatives travelled to Cardiff to see one part of Adam's legacy reach fruition - the Pembrokeshire Room at the new transplant unit in the Heath Hospital. The room provides a specially-designed area for the treatment of high dependency cases such as Adam's. Patients are treated in a completely sterile environment thanks to revolutionary new medical air conditioning units built into each room.

The day was an emotional one for Adam's family. His mother Chris said: "It's been a long journey, but seeing the plaque on the door made some sense of his short life - he has left his footprint, although a tiny one in the scale of things - nevertheless, one facing forward - moving from the past towards a far better future for those that follow him."

The next step was the creation of a new cancer care day unit in Withybush. Originally, the old ITU area was going to be the new site. Plans were drawn and a completion date of April 2007 was confidently given, but after much deliberation it became clear that the designs wouldn't work - it was a case of trying to fit a pint into a half pint pot.

In the meantime, the hospital went through an alarming stage of being threatened with closure. The Bucketful of Hope Appeal sought reassurances in writing that the cancer care day unit was not threatened. This given, at a meeting in May 2007, all fears were allayed and the appeal members were told of the new, exciting plans for the unit.

The new site is very much larger and is at present being examined by the architects, medical technicians and staff to ensure that every demand required from a state-of-the-art unit is met. The new plans will be unveiled by the middle of March 2008 on the "Wall of Hope" situated in the foyer of the hospital and on the appeal website: www.bucketfulofhope.co.uk.

Because of the extensive building work that is being carried out on Withybush at present, the completion date for the new unit has been given as April 2009. For the meantime the Bucketful of Hope appeal will continue fundraising for the new and exciting cancer care day unit and the materialisation of Adam's final wish.

4:31pm Monday 25th February 2008

Print

Email this