Friends Lead the Way in Initiating Research

The League of Friends of Lytham Hospital, one of the first in the country, and founded over fifty years ago as the NHS came into being, is living up to its tradition for originality and innovation. It has now become the first League of Friends in the country to sponsor a piece of vital research which could help detect the early onset of Alzheimer’s Disease.

The project carried out by Steve Higham, research assistant in psychology at Lancaster University, will look at ‘saccadic’ or intricate eye movements in a group of volunteers from Lytham and patients with Alzheimer’s Disease aged between 65 and 96.  Steve hopes that monitoring the way the eye responds to light stimulus from a laser beam could eventually become an important tool in diagnosing dementia. The sooner Alzheimer’s Disease is recognised, the more can be done to stimulate the patient’s mind and preserve their independence.

Geoff Stappard, Chairman of the Lytham Friends, says that he and other members didn’t realise they could sponsor a piece of research until they were approached by Dr Ted Renvoize, a Consultant in old age Psychiatry, who heads up research and development for the Blackpool, Wyre and Fylde Community Health Trust. He invited the Friends to come along to meetings of an organisation he had set up called

LADRIG (the Lancashire Alzheimer’s Disease Research and Interest Group), where professionals and carers looked together at ways of developing new insights into a traumatic progressive disease.  When they heard that the research team needed £30,000 for the equipment and staffing to carry out their research, they decided to raise the necessary funding. “We are committed to doing all we can to improve health services for local people and this seemed an excellent way of extending that commitment.  You just have to look round Lytham and see the average age of the inhabitants to know that this must be an important piece of research. Since many of our members are of retirement age we have also become Steve’s guinea pigs so that we can assist the project in every way we can.”

This brand new development for a Friends group nationally is very much in keeping with the Lytham’s group’s history of keeping ahead of the times. Traditionally Friends fund the renewal of machinery and pieces of equipment which hospitals cannot afford.  But as the focus of services in a Community Hospital like Lytham shifts from surgery to primary care, and the Friends felt they could do more than simply provide new equipment.  Initiating research into aspects of primary care which will benefit the local community has given their fund-raising a new lease of life.

Challenge Issue 32 - Spring 2001