AN ANNIVERSARY dinner dance saw more than 240 guests raise money for brain tumour research.

On Saturday, June 18, The Samantha Dickson Fund held a 25th charity anniversary Dinner Dance in Dogmersfield.

The guests raised over £25,000 for research into brain tumours, pushing the sum past the historic £100m fundraising mark for The Brain Tumour Charity.

The Dinner Dance featured live music and special guest auction prizes that included a knitted blanket kindly donated by The Brain Tumour Charity’s high profile supporter, Tom Daley.

Charity founders Neil and Angela Dickson, from Hampshire, said: “The 25 years have flown by. It only seems like yesterday when we were sitting at our kitchen table establishing what was the first dedicated brain tumour charity in the UK.

“In that first year of the charity we raised £140,000 and in our last financial year we have raised £11.4m despite being restricted by Covid. The total raised over the last 25 years has now surpassed £100m."

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The Brain Tumour Charity is the largest dedicated funder of research into brain tumours globally. Formed after the merger of Brain Tumour UK, Samantha Dickson Brain Tumour Trust and the Joseph Foote Trust, their work is inspired by Samantha and Joseph, who died from brain tumours.

The Samantha Dickson Fund raises money for The Brain Tumour Charity in Samantha’s name and restricts the funding to high grade glioma, the tumour type that she had.

Samantha was just 14 when she started to suffer from headaches and vomiting, followed by episodes of memory loss. She was finally diagnosed after collapsing and being rushed to hospital in Southampton.

She died on October 31 1996, seven days before her 17th birthday.

The Samantha Dickson Research Trust was registered in February 1997.

Gina Almond, director of fundraising for The Brain Tumour Charity, said: “The Samantha Dickson Fund’s Dinner Dance was an inspirational evening, uniting so many of our community to our cause.

“All the guests’ generosity and heartfelt desire to be part of a force for change, made it a truly special event indeed. Neil and Angela continue to be a beacon of inspiration to everyone we support and their tireless fundraising and awareness efforts, in memory of Samantha, have been instrumental in us reaching this milestone funding figure."

Anyone affected by a brain tumour can get support on 0808 800 0004. Find out more at thebraintumourcharity.org/

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