People & Lifestyle story, October 2005
| SURGEON RUNS
FOR RESEARCH
Dedicated doctor is both researcher and fundraiser As appeared in the Lytham St Anne’s Express By: Andrea Kon |
Dr. Grant Stewart, a 29-year-old Lytham St Annes born medic, is aiming to become a urology consultant. But so anxious is he to help unravel the key to curing prostate cancer, that he is first spending three years researching the disease that currently kills 10,000 British men every year. To cap this he is also fundraising to pay for this research too.
A keen athlete, he ran the Great North Run 13.1 mile half-marathon from Newcastle to South Shields on September 19th, to raise money for Prostate Research Campaign UK, the only organisation in Britain to provide patient information and fund research into all forms of prostate disease. And Dr. Stewart, whose parents Ian and Florence live in Stanley Street, and who ran for Scotland while at Edinburgh University, hopes he will beat his current record for the middle distance of 1hr 30 minutes.
“I’m very lucky that I have been chosen to start in Elite position, alongside the best 200 runners, including Kenyan and African runners who are the fastest in the world, and not back with joggers,” he laughs. “I’ve run the Great North five or six times before. I did the London Marathon once, but I prefer the middle distance.”
Dr. Stewart says he’s chosen to run for Prostate Research because he is very concerned at the lack of knowledge and low profile the disease currently has, despite the devastation it can cause to men and their families if it goes undiagnosed for any length of time.
“It is very under-played, yet 30,000 men are diagnosed with the disease in Britain every year,” he says, “many of them through ignorance about the early symptoms. I decided to spend three years researching into the causes and cures for prostate cancer before continuing with my clinical career as a potential urologist.
But research is very expensive and I decided that researching just isn‘t enough. I need to help to pay towards that research, and to raising the profile of prostate disease. I‘d be very grateful for some sponsorship which will help towards that.”
If you would like to sponsor Dr. Stewart in retrospect, you can write to him c/o Tissue Injury & Repair Unit, 1st Floor, Chancellor’s Building, Royal Infirmary of Edinburgh, 49 Little France Crescent, Edinburgh EH16 4SB. Please mark the envelope ‘Run’. Or offer sponsorship by email: [email protected]. For further information about prostate disease, contact Prostate Research Campaign UK, 10 Northfields Prospect, Putney Bridge Road, London SW18 1PE or visit their website at www.prostate-campaign.org.uk.