Bonding Over Brain Cancer

LAST week, local Scone residents Professor Garry Willgoose and Veronica Antcliff met Mark Hughes when the Mark Hughes Foundation held a charity BBQ at the radio-therapy unit at GenesisCare at Lake Macquarie Private Hospital.

Garry Willgoose had just finished that day’s radio-therapy treatment on his brain cancer.

Sconeites Veronica Antcliff and Prof Garry Willgoose met with Mark Hughes (centre) for a BBQ at Lake Macquarie Hospital.

Many Sconeites will know Garry from the Scone Swimming Pool during the summer. However, because he works in Newcastle during the week, many others will better know his wife, Veronica Antcliff, as she has been the Clerk of the Local Court at Scone Court House since 2003. She has taken leave to look after Garry in Newcastle while he undergoes his current round of radio-therapy and chemo-therapy but will be back on deck in Scone shortly when this current treatment round is finished. Garry is a long-term resident of the Upper Hunter as he grew up in Muswellbrook while his father Colin managed the abattoirs in Aberdeen during the 1960s and 1970s. After graduating as an Engineer in 1980 Garry worked for 4 years before doing a Masters and PhD at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) in Boston, subsequently returning as an lecturer in Environmental Engineering to Newcastle University.

While brain cancer is a relatively rare cancer, it is difficult to treat and is the main cancer killer of adults aged under 40. The cure rate across all sufferers is that about 20% survive five years, while for people of Garry’s age only 5% survive five years, and half of those diagnosed die within one year of diagnosis. The primary aim of the Mark Hughes Foundation is to improve those poor survival rates through research into better treatment regimes.

Beanie Week will be held on July 29 to 2 August this year. All National Rugby League games in Round 19 (25-28 July) are part of the Beanie for Brain Cancer round, with all the profits going to the Mark Hughes Foundation ($3.5 million was raised in 2018). The beanies are also currently available at Lowes. One of the important services that the Foundation funds is specialist brain cancer nurses throughout NSW who support both the sufferers and their families, similar to how the Jane McGrath Foundation funds breast cancer nurses.

Donations to the Foundation can also be made at markhughesfoundation.com.au.