A symbol of hope
Ringing the bell can feel like a huge achievement.
It means patients who wish to can celebrate milestones throughout their journey, as well as using it as a way of celebrating the end of treatment, quite often with family and friends.
We are Tracey and Phil Payton.
We have three children: Holly, Ben and Emma.
In September 2013, our then 8 year old daughter, Emma, was diagnosed with Alveolar Rhabdomyosarcoma- a rare soft tissue cancer.
Chemotherapy started at Royal Manchester Children’s Hospital and in January 2014, the whole family flew to ProCure in Oklahoma so Emma could have NHS funded Proton Beam Therapy.
This is where we first came across an “end of treatment bell”.
To us, the bell was a goal: it was something to aim for when counting down the days and weeks we were away from our loved ones, and our entire support network.
Ringing the bell meant that she had done it! She had finished with this particular part of her cancer treatment and we were heading home...
Emma rang the ProCure bell on March 5th, 2014 and we returned to the UK a few days later for the remainder of Emma's treatment.
We loved the bell and the symbolic nature of it.
We showed Emma's bell ringing video to staff on Ward 84 at RMCH and they agreed it would be fantastic to have one. We worked with Joe Faulkner of Sign and Display Limited to design a bell which would help brighten up a children's ward, and had one made in time for Emma to be the first ringer of the bell after her last chemotherapy session on April 9th, 2014.
Emma is thriving and thankfully, remains cancer free.
Since then, we have placed hundreds of bells in the UK and abroad and have shared thousands of patient stories, as well as celebration videos and photographs.
We have run numerous awareness campaigns to highlight the signs and symptoms of children's cancers.
Originally, the bell was offered as a way to celebrate 'End of Treatment', for cancer patients, hence our name. However, it soon became apparent that people were ringing it to celebrate other parts of their journey, for a stable scan, or an anniversary date. As a result of this, we launched a new 'Milestone' bell in March 2022 with a more appropriate poem which was written by Jane Brady, a patient at CanTreat who has secondary breast cancer.
Despite our name, we have no stipulation as to when a patient can, or should, ring the bell. We encourage patients to ring the bell whenever they want and for whatever reason they wish to celebrate!
In March 2019, we rolled out our Neonatal Intensive Care Unit bell to complement the Beads of Courage UK and Ireland programme.
In December 2021, we were honoured to receive a Points of Light award from the Prime Minister for our services to volunteering.
In 2022, we rolled out the Milestone Bell and Plaque and we were absolutely thrilled to be awarded with a Special Recognition trophy at the Pride of Manchester awards.
In 2023, our eldest daughter, Holly, graduated from Liverpool University and is now a practising therapeutic radiographer in Edinburgh.
Awareness Campaigns
We became aware of how underfunded research is into children’s cancers and how little knowledge the general public have about it. Through our social media pages, we run targeted awareness campaigns and share patient stories about real-life family experiences in order to spread awareness of signs, symptoms and treatments.
Our pages regularly feature adult stories as well as children’s. If you would like to share yours, please get in touch.
Thank you
Tracey and Phil Payton
