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Cancer Prevention and Early Diagnosis Resources for the Traveller Community

Creating cancer prevention resources for the traveller community.

Bowel Cancer symptoms

"The cancer prevention and early diagnosis training was incredibly valuable for both the community health workers and the individuals we support. The A5 resources developed during the project were practical and accessible, making it easier for health workers to discuss sensitive topics like cancer prevention.”- Facilitator 

This project produced cancer prevention and early diagnosis resources with and for the Traveller community. It aimed to raise awareness about the signs and symptoms of skin, prostate, breast, bowel, and lung cancer. Traveller Community Health Workers underwent training around the five most common cancers in Ireland. Resources were also designed to spread awareness about cancer among the Traveller community.  

The project took place between April and December 2024, to coincide with cancer awareness months: 

  • April- Bowel Cancer Awareness Month, 

  • May-September-Skin Cancer Awareness Months, 

  • September- Prostate Awareness Month, 

  • October- Breast Cancer Awareness Month, and 

  • November- Lung Cancer Awareness Month.

The project took place across four Traveller projects in Roscommon and Galway:  

  • County Roscommon Traveller project in Roscommon town, 

  • Tuam Primary Healthcare Project in Tuam,  

  • South-East Galway Project in Ballinasloe, and  

  • The Galway City Project in Galway City.

30 Community Health Workers took part in cancer awareness training. These workers targeted over 6,000 Travellers across Roscommon and Galway in their outreach programme. 

Cancer specific resources were made available to the Traveller community, including leaflets, posters, and WhatsApp messaging scripts and videos. 

This project was innovative as it focused on improving awareness about cancer prevention and early diagnosis in a specific ethnic group. Members of the Traveller community are now more likely to detect worrying symptoms and to get checked by a doctor.  

“All of our community health workers really benefitted from the several different sessions of cancer prevention that were run by Caroline Murray.”- Facilitator

This project was a collaboration between Health Service Executive (HSE) Health Promotion and Improvement, Community Healthcare West, County Roscommon Traveller Health Project, Galway Traveller Movement, and HSE Traveller Health Primary Care Division.  

For more information about the project, please contact Patrick Fox, Regional Literacy Coordinator at Galway Roscommon ETB, at patrick.fox@gretb.ie  

The Adult Literacy for Life Collaboration and Innovation Fund

The Collaboration and Innovation Fund supports projects for adults with unmet literacy, numeracy and digital literacy needs and projects that support organisations to be literacy friendly. The closing date for 2024 applications has now passed but keep an eye out for information on our 2025 fund which will be launched in December.