You Need To Know campaign scoops another award

Our life-saving womb cancer awareness campaign, in partnership with leading gynae charity Eve Appeal and communications agency AKT Health, has won another prestigious award as further recognition of the positive impact this is having on women’s lives in north east London.

The campaign – called ‘You Need to Know’ - aims to increase awareness of womb cancer – and the main symptom being bleeding after the menopause - amongst Black African, Black Caribbean and South Asian women in north east London, helping to reduce a health inequality gap that data showed existed.

Not long after receiving a Bronze Award at the PM Society awards in the Diversity & Inclusion in Creative Communications category, You Need To Know won the Patient and Carer prize in the category 'People affected by cancer’, as voted for by patients at the Cancer Research UK Early Diagnosis Conference.

Sherrice Weekes, Project Manager for North East London Cancer Alliance, proudly presented the campaign at the conference and the judges were impressed by both the visual images of the campaign, and the results it has achieved. Her hard work, along with Harjeet Dhanota, Project Officer, North East London Cancer Alliance, has been rewarded as praise for the campaign continues to pour in.

Phayza Fudlalla, one of the local volunteers involved from the very start, says “The campaign touched my heart because I would like to see some changes and increase awareness of womb cancer.  I have a family member affected by womb cancer and so this is really important to me.

“I would like to see more women approaching their GP immediately if they experience any of the symptoms.  From my own experience, language and cultural barriers can stop women in my community from approaching their GP.”

Other campaigns in the spotlight

Two other projects also featured at the Cancer Research UK event. One is a cancer awareness project which supports our local Charedi Jewish community. The project provides funding to a local charity, Acheinu Cancer Support (ACS), to drive a programme of cancer awareness, engagement events and communications across north east London.

This was presented at the event by Obi Oniyah, Prevention, Awareness and Screening Programme Manager for North East London Cancer Alliance.

The other was a project in partnership with behaviour change communications agency Claremont UK, which has delivered excellent research on barriers to screening uptake amongst ‘white other’ audiences – such as Polish, Romanian and Turkish - in north east London.

Caroline Cook, Early Diagnosis Programme Lead for North East London Cancer Alliance said: “I’m incredibly proud of what my team has achieved, and this especially includes the amazing volunteers who took part in the campaign. I can’t thank them enough for their enthusiasm, warmness, and input, making sure that our messages were right for our target audience.

“This is just one of many exciting projects taking place this year across our Early Diagnosis Programme, where we are aiming to diagnose 75% of all cancers at stage 1 or stage 2 by 2028.

“Through campaigns like You Need To Know, we are hoping to lead the way in how to speak – and importantly, in how to listen, to local communities so we can really make a difference to their health and wellbeing.”

More about You Need To Know

The campaign – called ‘You Need to Know’ - aims to increase awareness of womb cancer – and the main symptom being bleeding after the menopause - amongst Black African, Black Caribbean and South Asian women in north east London.

Local volunteers were involved right from the very start of the campaign, helping to understand key barriers and challenges from within the community and then working with North East London Cancer Alliance and partners on the campaign messaging and visuals.

As well as helping to design it, the volunteers even appeared in the campaign on posters, adverts and in the campaign video.

You can watch the video here: https://youtu.be/qSAIoJX93Nk?si=hKefjcCKe9TDrqZN

North East London Cancer Alliance and Eve Appeal have also been delivering interactive awareness sessions to community groups, speaking to over 300 women and people with a womb about the key messages of the campaign.

Read more about the campaign here: https://www.nelcanceralliance.nhs.uk/youneedtoknow