Who Cares Wins: Medical Journalists Vote Arthritis Care Health Charity Of The Year, UK

Main Category: Arthritis / Rheumatology
Article Date: 04 Jul 2008 - 2:00 PDT

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The UK's leading organisation supporting and representing the interests of people with any of the 200 forms of arthritis was last night voted Health Charity of the Year by members of the Medical Journalists' Association.

The user-led charity, which celebrated its diamond jubilee in 2007 and pre-dates the NHS by one year, beat a distinguished field to scoop the coveted award. Fellow short-listers were the British Heart Foundation, Mencap, the Royal National Institute for the Blind, and the Prostate Cancer Charity.

Some nine million people in the UK have arthritis. It has no cure, comes in forms ranging from rheumatoid arthritis to osteoarthritis, gout and lupus, and is the biggest cause of physical disability in the country. It affects people of any age, including 12,000 children, toddlers, and babies.

'Arthritis Care aims to be the first point of call and 'one-stop-shop' for anyone wanting to learn about arthritis in any of its 200 forms. This award is a vote of confidence in the information we provide to the media and to the public, and it's fantastic that it comes from the big hitters of the MJA. They are the respected, authoritative communicators who influence health and public policy, so if we are helping them, then we're doing our own job of helping people with arthritis to get their voices heard', said Rachel Haynes, Arthritis Care's director of public affairs, who collected the award at last night's ceremony at the Royal Society of Medicine.

Arthritis Care provides free helplines and publishes a range of jargon-free factsheets and booklets offering information and support to people with arthritis, or affected by it. It also offers free-to-user self-management courses, equipping people with long term conditions to live 'smart', and to run their lives more effectively beyond the surgery door. Its website also operates discussion forums where people with arthritis, often isolated by disability, can meet and offer mutual peer support, sharing experiences and swapping ideas and tips for coping with arthritis.

Arthritis Care, established in 1947, is the UK's largest voluntary organisation committed to supporting people with arthritis. Arthritis Care predates the NHS by one year and has always pioneered self-management, including introducing American-style courses to the UK in the 1990s, which paved the way to the Expert Patient Programme.

Arthritis Care