Making the difference for patients and carers

Bedford Hospitals Charity raises money for the hospital to pay for improvements at Bedford Hospital that the NHS cannot or will not pay for.

Half a Million Appeal

We are now beginning a new appeal, the Half a Million Appeal, to mark the 30th anniversary of the Charity. It will be for £½ million and will be used to purchase four items of equipment for diagnostics and treatment plus equipment for the hospital radio service. More details here.

Primrose Cars

The Primrose Cars Service provides free transport to take patients for radiotherapy treatment from their homes to Addenbrookes Hospital in Cambridge. Every two to three years the Charity needs to raise funds to buy new, replacement cars in order to continue this valuable service for the people of Bedford

£1,000,000 Donation

The Bedford Hospitals Charity has provided Bedford Hospital with a new £1,000,000 Magnetic Resonance Imaging (MRI) Scanner.

A Siemens Magnetom Aera 1.5 tesla magnet machine is on order and is due to be installed towards the end of this year. The scanner will be housed in a new building and will allow the decommissioning of the machine currently in a trailer, meaning that Bedford Hospital will have two modern scanners in one building.

A brief history

The Bedford Hospitals Charity was founded 30 years ago in 1988 by a group of local people, initially to raise money to refurbish the dilapidated and antiquated Student Nurse Home at Bedford Hospital South Wing. Since then it has raised well over £10million for a number of projects. The largest was £2.35 million raised in the Primrose Appeal to build a new Oncology Unit.

Fundraisers

Here are a selection of some of the fund-raising events that people have held on behalf of the Charity.

Tina Fooks

Tina, a Primrose patient, raised over £800 for the Primrose Car Renewal Appeal by walking 64 miles of Hadrian’s Wall in four days.

Crane Fund for Widows and Children

Here we see Gordon Beeden and Mike Hurst (representing The Hospital Charity) receiving $5000 from The Crane Fund for Widows and Children.

Ciro Ciampi’s 40th

Three events in three days over the 23-25 September -The Sharnbrook 10th Anniversary & Ciro’s 40th Birthday Fundraiser Ball, Ciro’s 40th Birthday ExtravaGANGSTER & Charity Funday Sunday with Supercar Dreamrides – raising £11,435 for the Primrose Unit Bedford Hospital.