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Winner of Turn it Purple Pharmacy of the Year Award 2018!

This November was our first ever Turn it PurpleTM Pharmacy of the Year Award. Our Award encouraged pharmacies across the country to further their knowledge of the disease and raise awareness of pancreatic cancer in their local communities. The award was created to commend pharmacy teams for the important role they play in aiding early diagnosis.

We are thrilled to announce this year’s winner is Knights Oakwood Pharmacy in Birstall! Read below to find out what they got up to this November and view a gallery of photos.

KNIGHTS OAKWOOD- photo of the team holding raffle donations

We had almost 100 pharmacies take part across the UK and we were so pleased to be inundated with applications. All the pharmacies were so enthusiastic and all thought of new ways to raise awareness of pancreatic cancer.

From purple hair, bake sales, social media and radio interviews to MP’s and Mayors visiting the pharmacies, teams pulled together to help raise awareness within their local community and went above and beyond to help fundraise for early diagnosis research.

We went through every application and looked at a range of factors to help decided on the winning pharmacy. We considered pharmacies awareness efforts, social media, decorations, creativity and community reach on a point system to fairly determine the winners of 2018!

2018 winners: Knights Oakwood Pharmacy 

Knights Oakwood have around 4,000 active patients and first heard of the campaign on the Healthy Living Pharmacy West Yorkshire Facebook page. The manager of the store, Paula Woodgate, initially held a team meeting to discuss the importance of raising awareness for pancreatic cancer and to encourage the pharmacy team to think of ideas for raising awareness.

Everyone in the team completed the e-learning module on pancreatic cancer including: pharmacists, technicians, dispensers, healthcare assistants, delivery drivers, Saturday staff and even the cleaner. The driving force behind this was “if our awareness campaigns saves just one life, then our campaign will have been a success.”

Quote from pharmacy " Staff and family members were all commenting when they went out shopping, they all ended up looking for purple items that could be suitable to add to the raffle."

The pharmacy raised money for PCA by holding an incredible raffle, this included purple hampers made by family and friends and over 25 prizes from local businesses from free dinners to manicure vouchers. The raffle was not only a great way to raise fund but it also provided the pharmacy an opportunity to raise awareness within local businesses.

One family member made sparkly purple brooches which they sold alongside items to fundraise for Pancreatic Cancer Action. In total the team raised over £465 for Pancreatic Cancer Action, through working together as a team and sharing ideas with their family and the local community.

Every wall of the Knights Oakwood pharmacy was decorated with purple, which prompted customers to find out more. This allowed the pharmacy an opportunity to openly discuss the risks, signs and symptoms of pancreatic cancer with customers.

Quote: "We have heard families experiences of this devastating condition, and some staff have literally been in tears after talking to customers."

The team also posted on their social media every day in November with pancreatic cancer health information.  As well as raising awareness to the local community, they also posted daily facts on pancreatic cancer on the Knights Pharmacy forum. This resulted in members of the Knights head office visiting the pharmacy to see the display first-hand.

Gallery of photos from Knights Oakwood Pharmacy

Lu Constable, Marketing Communications Manager at PCA, who helped decide on the winning pharmacy, said:

It is our absolute pleasure to award the team at Knights Oakwood with the Turn it Purple Pharmacy of the Year Award 2018. The team really went above and beyond when it came to raising awareness of the cause in their pharmacy and out in the local community. They grasped the important message that symptom awareness is vital for early diagnosis and completely embraced the fun spirit of the campaign which helped to create conversation with patients and customers..

We cannot forget all of the wonderful pharmacies that took part in Turn it Purple and entered the Award. We were totally blown away by the hard work of everyone involved and it was a hard to separate the pharmacies efforts. However, we believe that Knights Oakwood Pharmacy are very worthy winners.

Thank you to every pharmacy that took part in the campaign and entered. Every pharmacy that entered the award will receive a certificate of recognition.