Elvis Presley’s Crown Reaches Gloucestershire On mouth Cancer Awareness Tour
Patients at a Cheltenham dental practice were encouraged to put on their blue suede shoes and celebrate the life and times of Elvis Presley this week, as his crown arrived in town. The tooth, which is owned by a Canadian dentist, is touring a dozen or so dental practices in the UK as part of an effort to raise awareness of mouth cancer.
The team at Greyholme Dental Suite donned Elvis-inspired costumes on Wednesday 15th May to welcome the King’s tooth to the practice.
On Wednesday morning, practice manager, Leanne Butler, welcomed patients into the surgery to join in the celebration. As well as having lots of fun, the team was also eager to promote a serious message and oral cancer survivor, Denise Powell, gave a short talk about her battle with the disease.
The 41 year old shared her story from the moment she feared there may be something wrong when she accidentally bit down on a mouth ulcer to find that it was very hard, to the difficulties she faced trying to learn to talk again and eat properly after being fed through a tube into her stomach for a year. After finding what she thought was an ulcer, Denise was told by doctors at Cheltenham General Hospital that she had a tumour and would need surgery. Between the day she was diagnosed and going to theatre, the tumour had already grown 3cm and after the operation, life was very hard. Denise was unable to speak properly and she couldn’t eat for 12 months.
Denise explained that although it was very difficult, she never gave up hope and said that with cancer, you have to just keep being strong and hoping for the best.
Dr Warren Martin said that it was an honour to be one of the practices hosting the ‘weird and wonderful’ piece of memorabilia and explained that the event had been a great success and a lot of fun, as well as a great opportunity to get people talking about mouth cancer, which is really important as public awareness of the disease remains relatively low.
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