The Aspergillus Trust
The End of the Beginning...
The Aspergillus Trust has been dissolved as a registered UK charity after six years of successful operation.
The small band of trustees felt that they had achieved all they could reasonably be expected to with the resources available to them and felt that future developments would be best served by handing over assets to the Fungal Research Trust (FRT), a charity with a long history in fungal disease research and the charity that funds the Aspergillus Website
- with whom the Aspergillus Trust already have a close relationship.
In return there is planned to be a seat on the board of trustees of the FRT for an ex-Aspergillus Trust trustee for the purpose of highlighting patients' issues in the FRT's future work.
The Next Phase
The UK Department of Health has announced that the world's first centre for the treatment of aspergillosis is to be opened in Manchester in April 2009. The centre will be based at the same location as the Aspergillus Website and will have an ex-Aspergillus Trust trustee on site. The Fungal Research Trust have a large presence at the same location.
Many of the aims of the Aspergillus Trust have been taken up in the conception of the new centre and patient needs are to be well catered for. There will be a dedicated nurse and councillor for patient support together with a fully featured patient support website incorporating many of the features of the old Aspergillus Trust and Fungal Research Trust Patients' Support websites & support group.
This means many aims of the AT such as improving information flow to patients and doctors alike will be achieved, and what is more as a fully NHS funded service - quite a spectacular success story.
Those aims will continue to be sought after and expanded at the new National Centre for Aspergillosis and by the Fungal Research Trust. Ex-Aspergillus Trust trustees will continue to have a voice for patients and that voice will be heard.
Many thanks to all of you who have supported the Aspergillus Trust until now. We hope that you will continue your support through supporting the work of the FRT.
The AT trustees, November 2008
