Fundraising appeal to aid Western General extension

A CRISP fiver might not buy you much more than lunch or a couple of coffees.

Western General Royal Victoria Building. Picture; Greg Macvean

It could also give a cancer patient comfort in their darkest days by paying for a new mug for the Edinburgh Maggie’s Centre.

The Evening News has teamed up with Maggie’s and city fundraiser Lisa Stephenson for the Buy a Brick appeal, which aims to raise more than £750,000 for an extension to the centre at the Western General Hospital.

Established in memory of landscape architect Maggie Keswick Jencks in 1996, the Edinburgh Maggie’s Centre has helped thousands of cancer patients and their families over the past 20 years.

There is so much more that Maggie’s can do but they need your help.

The £1.2m extension would add three new rooms for activities and therapy sessions, more drop-in space and extensions to the garden. The plans would allow an additional 5,000 patients a year to seek emotional and practical support at the centre, which aims to fill the gaps left behind after their 
hospital care. More than £440,000 has been raised by mum-of-two Lisa Stephenson, who has used the Edinburgh centre often was diagnosed with myeloma in 2011.

But we still need to raise £750,000 to make the dream a reality.

Whatever you can afford will make a huge difference to the appeal. Whether it’s £10 to pay for a bowl of fruit for patients, £41 to run the kettles for the day, or £1,500 to pay for the centre’s new door, it will all help Maggie’s to deliver the special kind of care that transforms people’s lives.