Journalism for cancer patients

Alexander Masters is an author and freelance journalist based in the United Kingdom. His committed journalism has been crucial to establishing a unique clinical trial for seriously ill cancer patients at Uppsala University Hospital. For his efforts, Alexander Masters is now being installed as an honorary doctor in the Disciplinary Domain of Medicine and Pharmacy.

What does this honorary doctorate mean to you?

”It feels great! I was both proud and astonished when I received the news that I had been awarded an honorary doctorate at Uppsala University. I work with two superb patient advocates, communication consultants Dominic Nutt and Liz Scarff, who work a professional web campaigner. Through our world of creative writing and journalism, we helped to raise the funds needed to conduct clinical trials of a promising cancer product developed at Uppsala University.”

”Together, we solved a problem that was potentially preventing work to save lives. Despite knowing nothing about academic methods or manners, we succeeded with our fundraising and advocacy campaign for cancer research. The ethics of using crowdfunding to sponsor clinical studies is a new and important issue that has been highlighted in lectures and scientific journals.”

What is your relationship with Uppsala University like today?

”Lovely!. I drink my coffee in the morning out of an Uppsala University mug and read the Uppsala University magazine over breakfast. Then I turn to my endlessly patient friend Magnus Essand, professor of gene therapy at Uppsala University, whenever I need advice about something new that we are working on to benefit patients.”

Are you still involved in cancer research?

”Yes, I still work to help patients and patient organisations, even if it’s still in the same slightly odd way that I began, i.e., out on the margins. Above all, I try to find ideas for solving deep-seated problems with neglected clinical trials. In my case, it always comes back to funding. and that’s how my interest in Uppsala University began.”

”At the moment, we’re working with researchers at the universities of Oxford and Warwick on a possible new way for participants to finance a mass study into the co-morbidities of ageing, which of course includes cancer. There’s a vast supply of expertise and enthusiasm out here in the non-university world, and universities still don’t seem to know how to take proper advantage of it. That’s another interesting subject. You could write a cracking doctoral thesis – a real one – about that, concludes Alexander Masters.”

Cecilia Yates