THE world’s first mobile chemotherapy unit (MCU) – named ‘Helen’ – stopped off at Cirencester Tesco this afternoon for an open day fundraising event run by the charity that launched it in partnership with the NHS over nine years ago.

Hope for Tomorrow (HFT) is a national cancer charity dedicated to bringing cancer treatment closer to patients’ homes through the use of its 10 MCUs across the UK, cutting down on waiting times and travelling distances at oncology centres, with Helen being the first unit on the road in 2007.

Last year, the charity won a Queen’s Award for Enterprise due to their work.

Claire Cosgrove, HFT head of communications and fundraising, said: “What we’re trying to do today is help boost our appeal for a replacement vehicle. We’ve got a new design which we launched last year and it’s building on the feedback we’ve had from patients over the years.

“We would love for the 10th birthday to be able to present a brand new vehicle for Gloucestershire. Then this lovely lady [Helen] wouldn’t be retired, it would be refurbished to become a reserve vehicle. With 10 units on the road all over the country at any moment one could be off the road for servicing and we don’t want treatments to be stopped.”

Helen is based at Cheltenham Hospital’s oncology centre and travels across the county four days a week to provide mobile chemotherapy sessions for cancer patients outside community hospitals in Cirencester, Stroud, Tewkesbury and the Forest of Dean, as well as other public locations.

“It’s a mixture of locations for the 10 units,” said Claire. “As long as we can get flat parking and can plug in the electrics, it’s flexible.”

The MCU has two on-board oncology nurses and can treat four patients at any time, and up to 20 across the course of a day.

Claire said the NHS provides the nurses and the chemotherapy treatment, but it costs £260,000 to launch a new unit and £15,000 to keep one on the road for a year, which includes servicing every 12 weeks, all of which is paid for by the charity.

Julie Ford, senior sister at Cheltenham oncology centre, one of the on-board nurses, explained that chemotherapy sessions can last anywhere from 15 minutes to two and a half hours, while treatments on the MCU tend to be “low risk chemotherapy, so there is less chance of a patient having a reaction.”

Sue Thomas, who was made a HFT ambassador by Princess Anne last year, is a long-term cancer survivor, while her husband Tony was one of the first ever patients on the Gloucestershire mobile unit.

“Nothing like this was ever available to me, my husband was treated for four years, and two of those years were a 55-mile round trip to Cheltenham [for each chemotherapy session],” she said. “The following two years he was treated on the unit and I don’t think he would have survived as long otherwise.

“It gave us more time to be together, I’m sure of that, and I’ve been a supporter ever since,” she added. “Without the charity, this would not exist.” Clemency Rubinstein, HFT community fundraiser and head of the volunteer programme, from Cirencester, battled cancer in 2013 and was treated on Helen.

“The most appalling shock of my entire life,” she said. “First of all you have to be treated in the main oncology unit [at Cheltenham Hospital] and then I was offered the chance to be treated in Cirencester on Helen. I’m young but so many people are older who have issues travelling, while the fact this is so close to home made it a much more manageable experience.”

Helen turned 50 on Saturday (April 24). She said: “I was scared I wasn’t going to make it to 50, so Saturday was really good.”

Visit hopefortomorrow.org.uk for more information.