Our impact together

A look back at 2023/24

This past year we’ve had more impact than ever before, thanks to incredible supporters like you. Their extraordinary contributions of time, effort and generous donations have made this past year a massive success. Together, we’re giving people affected by pancreatic cancer more than hope.

Read on to see how, with their help, we can see real change in sight for everyone affected by pancreatic cancer.

Earlier and faster diagnosis

Sadly, most people are diagnosed with pancreatic cancer late. Achieving earlier and faster diagnosis will mean more people can have treatment to save or extend their life.

During this period we invested £2.69m in grants and £1.1m in research support, bringing our total research spend to date at £14.4m.

We made our largest ever investment into detecting pancreatic cancer at the earliest possible stage, investing almost £1m in two large programmes of research.

1. We are funding Professor Nigel Jamieson at the University of Glasgow to carry out research to improve our understanding of what causes pancreatic cysts to develop into pancreatic cancer, so that high risk cysts can be identified and treated as soon as possible.
2. The second project will be led by Dr Vladamir Teif at the University of Essex and aims to develop a new blood test to identify pancreatic cancer at an early stage.

Accelerating treatment breakthroughs

Pancreatic cancer is complex, so treatment options are often limited. We need faster treatment breakthroughs to give people with pancreatic cancer a longer, better quality, life.

Nearly 30,000 of you signed the first phase of our Demand Survival Now petition, calling for greater research investment into pancreatic cancer. In March 2024 (pre the general election), we launched the second phase of this campaign to call on the new UK government to commit at least £35m a year for pancreatic cancer research over the next two decades.

We also launched one of our largest ever investments in treatment grants, our new Interdisciplinary Treatment Grants. The grants will encourage researchers from different disciplines to collaborate to improve current or find new approaches.

Across the year. we held a workshop for 35 researchers, clinicians and healthcare professionals across the UK with a variety of specialisms to discuss ways to improve pancreatic cancer treatment and care. This included nutrition, pain management and psychosocial support.

Good care everywhere

People with pancreatic cancer face a care postcode lottery. We’re doing everything we can to change this.

In October 2023 we launched our Faster, Fairer, Funded report, following two years’ work with health professionals and people with lived experience of pancreatic cancer. Together, we identified what needs to change to give everyone the best chance to live longer and live well, wherever they live in the UK.

Following this work, we published a report outlining how to implement the pathway. We have been working with the Department of Health and NIPANC, a Northern Ireland charity working to improve pancreatic cancer outcomes, and the Wales National Optimal Care Pathway for Pancreatic Cancer.

To support this work, our Don’t Write Me Off campaign called on governments across the UK to fund a Faster, Fairer, Funded pathway for people with pancreatic cancer. UK-wide, 37,257 people signed our petition.

Improving quality of life

Taking more control of their treatment and reducing the impact of their symptoms can improve people’s physical and emotional health, and their quality of life.

In July 2023 we launched our Services Reach Project to explore how to reach even more people through our services. To inform this we conducted interviews with, and surveyed people affected by pancreatic cancer as well as recruited volunteers onto the project team. Their insights are already helping us to develop and adapt services.

We also launched a new series of newly diagnosed videos which provide accessible and engaging summaries of key information, to help people at an overwhelming time.

Our specialist pancreatic cancer nurses supported over 2,000 people via the Support Line. 100% of people who contacted the Support Line for themselves said this helped them to ask questions of their medical team. Users also rated the information and support they received 4.88 out of 5.

We ran parliamentary events across the UK to encourage politicians to engage with and support our campaign . Over 3,800 of supporters, like you wrote to their parliamentarians about these events, which resulted in over 150 politicians attending our campaign events and related debates.

From this, over 40 parliamentarians tabled questions, wrote letters or shared our campaign on social media, with 50 MPs signing our Early Day Motion. We also provided vital training for health care professionals throughout the year. We ran 14 virtual educational events on topics including managing symptoms, nutrition, pancreatic enzyme replacing therapy (PERT) and psychosocial support. We had over 1,600 professionals attend our events, with 93% saying this increased their knowledge and understanding to better support professionals.