On Saturday 30 th March, nearly 140 Men, Masons and their families attended the first ever privately-
run Prostate screening session to be held in Hertfordshire and took place at the Halsey Masonic Hall,
Watford.
E. Comp. Phil Masters, 2nd Provincial Grand Principal along with the Graham Fulford Charity Trust,
and with the backing of the Most Excellent Grand Superintendent, E. Comp. James Sharpley and
supported by the Provincial Grand Master, R. W. Bro. Paul Gower, organized the event in
conjunction with Halsey Masonic Hall, Watford, who provided the venue for the event and even
offered complimentary teas and coffees to all the attendees and complimentary sandwiches to the
“workers” at no cost to the Province.
Additional help was provided by members of the Board from Halsey Masonic Hall, Watford and the
Provincial Grand Stewards Lodge no 8984.
We had the assistance of eight Phlebotomist from the local area who gave up their time freely to
assist in raising awareness of this cancer and the testing of men over the age of 40. Before the
session was commenced, the Most Excellent Grand Superintendent presented the girls with a small
gift as a token of our appreciation. It was was not all work and no play however, as it was the first
time for a while, that some of the Phlebotomist had seen and worked together as can be seen in one
of the photos.
The team of Phlebotomists was led by Tracey Dempsey, partner of E. Comp. Darren Bending,
Assistant to the Provincial Grand Principals who travelled down from Lincolnshire to assist in the
event.
Our hundredth participant in the initiative was E. Comp. Robert Asser, our Past Provincial DC and 3 rd
Provincial Grand Principal designate who can be seen having his blood taken in the attached photo.
Over £1,000.00 was collected on the day for the charity included gift aid which represents nearly
50% of the cost of the testing which is being underwritten by the Provincial Grand Chapter and
Provincial Grand Lodge of Hertfordshire.
Prostate cancer is one of the biggest unknown killers of men over 40 and this event, apart from
providing men over the age of 40, the opportunity to be tested for this disease, was also designed to
raise awareness of this silent killer.
Our partner in this initiative was the Graham Fulford Charitable Trust (GFCT) which was set up by
Graham Fulford to promote awareness of Prostate Cancer following the diagnosis of a close friend of
his who died at the age of 58 and a close family member who also died in 2007 with prostate cancer
after a valiant fight.
Since 2004, together with their partners, GFCT have been involved in testing over 80,000 men and
conducting over 112,000 tests so far.
Consequently, there has been well over 1,500 known cancers identified that otherwise may not have
been discovered.