Bloodwise do have some leaflets and cards, I distribute them everywhere. The Bloodwise support line details are above.
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I havenāt seen the campaign other than on FB, surely it should be promoted elsewhere or do I watch//listen to the wrong stations
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Hi Sylvia. Having been involved with Bloodwise for a number of years, I do understand what you are saying about lack of publicity for Bloodwise. In September they do a big awareness campaign, and in 2017 many of us distributed leaflets in surgeries, hospitals and pharmacies, but unfortunately space to display booklets and leaflets is quite limited in hospitals and surgeries, especially if they are promoting something like getting flu jabs or sepsis at the same time. Some supermarkets also displayed posters. There were also billboards promoting Bloodwise.
Some of us have done awareness stands at hospitals and spoken at conferences, and spoken to MPs about the future of cancer care. You may also remember Nick Clegg and his wife spoke about their son who had been diagnosed with blood cancer and the support they had from Bloodwise. Simon Thomas, whose wife died from AML within a week of diagnosis, has also spoken about the support he and his son have had from Bloodwise, and is now President of Bloodwise.
MacMillan often have a base in hospitals, as they cover all cancers and offer a very wide range of services. Likewise Cancer Research UK has been able to raise its profile due to Race for Life, which was primarily for Breast Cancer.
The question is also where funds raised by supporters should be spentā¦research, patient support and information, media? It is a tricky balance
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If anyone is interested in football have a look at Carl Ikeme he had leukaemia and also Joe Thompson he had Lymphoma both do a lot to raise awareness. Also Geoff Thomas who had blood cancer. You can find them on Twitter and Facebook.
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I did part of the Beefy walk in 2012. My husband spoke for some time to Geoff Thomas. It was soon after Petrov (Aston Villa) had been diagnosed with Leukaemia, and there were many Brummies that āWalked for Petrovā
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I would love to do something like the Beefy walk. Yes of course there is Petrov too who has been a high profile blood cancer warrior.
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Unfortunately I donāt think he does them anymore. I donāt know which area you are from, but there are walks, triathlons, bikeathon and other events all over the country. Have a look on the Bloodwise website or on their FB pages
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Just spotted this topic, and I find it an extremely interesting one. Just to bring this up to date, I can see it is still an ongoing problem despite the heroic efforts of Bloodwise and their supporters. I was struck how blood cancer took a while to be listed as one of the high risk categories for Covid-19. In fact, I think even cancer itself was not listed (I believe the original list was heart conditions. diabitiies, respiratory conditions and possibly a couple of others). Really interested to see that @Pisces56 did the Beefy walk in 2012. Fantastic - did you get a chance to chat with him, he is definitely one of my heroes. I managed to meet Geoff Thomas at a Leukaemia Research Fund annual conference once (as well as the Calendar Girls!). There are so many famous people that have done a lot to support blood cancer over the years, which is so fantastic. I also more recently met Kelly Holmes who patiently posed for a photo to be used on my fundraising site. Apologies for the shameless name dropping. 
. She was so lovely, down to earth, zero ego -and since this, sady one of her family has been affected. All of them kind, selfless people, and they have made a massive difference to rasing the profile, but alas there is still a way to go. This is so important as the more people know about it the more likely it is that we will make more rapid progress towards beating it.
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@DavidAmbassador ah thatās lovely you were able to meet Kelly Holmes and get a photo too! 
Itās really good to see this topic come up again everyone, especially given the current situation. We have had people get in touch with us expressing how this has been a reminder to them of how little awareness there still seems to be around blood cancer. With many have challenges trying to explain their condition to their work, can anyone relate to this at all?
Hope you are all keeping safe!
Su
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@SuBloodcancerUK, @DavidAmbassador, @Robson, @Joan and @DickM, when I was first diagnosed I could not explain to my work what I was struggling to come to terms with and did not understand myself, I wish I had had access to the Bloodwise factsheets that were not available then. I also do not think we all pick up and take note of something that is not relevant to us. Personally I do take note of someone, especially someone famous who highlights a condition, usually because they have been touched by it, like Dame Kelly Holmes and when she was speaking I got quite emotional. Yes, I did some of the Beefy walks and he signed my tee shirt, brilliant for fundraising and he got the mediaās attention. Anything connected with the Calendar Girls also gets to me. Also people talk about breast cancer or prostate cancer whereas blood cancers are often called by their individual often complicated sounding names. We must all try and do our bit to raise the profile of blood cancer, Last September I wore a Bloodwise tee shirt every day I went to the gym, it was a brilliant talking point that people will remember because they know me. Any other thoughts of how we can raise the profile of Blood Cancer?
@Erica Brilliant idea Erica! using the t-shirts, yes, itād be really interesting to know what all of your experiences are, in terms of what seems to help raise awareness of blood cancer more? Does opening conversations with friends and family help for instance?
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Yes, opening up conversations does really spread the word, but when I start talking about the subject it is difficult to stop me.
ah thatās a good thing @Erica! itās sounds like talking to people and also celebrity support have been really helpful in raising awareness. Do people have experiences of other things which has helped too?
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Precisely @SuBloodcancerUK. As you say it relates to the work issue as well, and weāve had a recent discussion on that as well.
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Erica, just what is needed! (Like me with football and running!)
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Hiā all iām not one that generally posts on sites and usually log in to simply read about and update my own understanding and knowledge and feel that Iām not alone. However, maybe this post could be the start of outwardly getting more involved. My thoughts are and I stress it is purely my own humble opinion why āBlood Cancerā seems to have a low public profile and hence understanding by the general public is because blood cancer is itself an umbrella term used for a spectrum of cancers. This I think can in some ways be detrimental in that the media and following on from that the general public do not appreciate or understand what the term really relates to. If you was to talk about the most publicly known condition under the umbrella of blood cancer and say āLeukaemiaā immediately many persons not in any way affected by the disease would have some knowledge/ understanding of its serious nature but most likely would not know that itās within what we all know to be the spectrum of blood cancer/s. What people donāt talk about is less likely to become well known and until a couple of years ago I would not have known either. The latter I feel can be likened to the change of name from Bloodwise to Blood Cancer UK partially in order to open up and raise its profile amongst the general public who we hope to get on board and in doing so increase overall support from those not affected directly or indirectly by any of the array of blood cancers.
I hope that I have not caused any offence to anyone by what I have said as that is not my intention, I purely wished to constructively contribute to this particular post and hopefully not send anyone to sleep if Iāve gone on too long 
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Hi Shaka, welcome to the community. I think that some people have heard of leukaemia and some people have heard of lymphoma. But few people realise they are both blood cancers. I remember meeting a lady who had a very rare leukaemia once and we talked and I was able to explain that she actually had a blood cancer and that other people had blood cancers too from different cells within the blood. She felt a lot less alone by the end of the conversation. Perhaps if we pooled our efforts more and really helped people realise that while so many of these individual blood cancers are quite rare when looked at together they are much more common. Did you know that blood cancer as a whole is the fifth most common form of cancer? And the third biggest killer? I also think the fact that blood cancers are each quite rare helps to prevent diagnosis sometimes. GPs think āit couldnāt possibly beā¦ā Whereas if we got them to think more generally rather than trying to identify specific cancers instead realising the varied kinds of symptoms that might lead to a blood cancer diagnosis, and so doing a blood text X-ray or scan to ārule outā blood cancer rather than ignoring it as a possibility.
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@Adrian @Shaka thank you both so much for sharing your thoughts, so interesting to read through! We have also had some people get in touch with us and say that because the word ācancerā is not in the name of their condition e.g. acute myeloid leukaemia, chronic myeloid leukaemia. to give a couple of examples, they have found it challenging when trying to explain to people they are living with a type of cancer. I wonder if anyone has had similar experiences?
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Hiā Adrian, I agree with what you say which is what i meant when saying that in some ways the umbrella term Blood Cancer is detrimental with regard to the general publics appreciation of the spectrum of cancers that fall within it. As you say its the 5th most common but still the umbrella term is not so widely understood by those not affected directly or indirectly by it. Whereas the cancers within the Blood Cancer spectrum such as Leukaemia and Lymphoma etc are well known in their own right. Those who visit this site are more aware and appreciate the nature of this, the ongoing challenge is to get the general public to understand as they are often focused as is the media more on individual cancers of a specific type for varying reasons. Had it not been for my diagnosis then I like so many Iāve spoken with had not even heard of Myeloma let alone the stages of MGUS and smouldering/ asymptomatic and then it all falling within the sub group of Blood Cancer.
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Hi Shaka a great big welcome to our community forum and it is the ideal place to be able to share your views. Personally I think because of the stark figures of blood cancers being the 5th largest cancer and 3rd largest killer, it really gets the message across better in the enormous charity sector (let alone other aspects like research) than trying to get the message across with the individual 137, each very important condition. When I was diagnosed in 2003 with chronic lymphatic leukaemia it was hardly heard of and in those days the word cancer wasnāt used as widely with any conditions. Things have evolved so much. I think it might have been felt that the charity name obviously covered leukaemia and lymphoma, and it was becoming slightly more widely known that they were cancers of the blood, but not there were very many other, equally important, cancers of the blood out there. What I think we all need to do is spread the word and educate the world. I think our personal stories, be it as a patient, family member, friend or carer, really get the message across so well.
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