Her Royal Highness The Duchess of Cornwall meets a group of Osteoporosis sufferers to offer her support prior to World Osteoporosis Day on Saturday. The Duchess is President of the National Osteoporosis Society. Larence House, London, UK, 18 Oct 2012. Guy Bell, 07771 786236, guy@gbphotos.com
Last week we bought you the story about Jo Hawkes, Associate Lecture in Sport and Coaching Science, being asked to be a Chance to Shine Ambassador for the National Osteoporosis Society (See here)
In that article, we mentioned that Jo had been invited to Clarence House to meet with Camilla Parker-Bowles for the International Osteoporosis Foundation ‘Unbreakable Embrace’ campaign. Today we are bringing you Jo’s response to meeting Camilla Parker-Bowles.
October 20th each year is World Osteoporosis Day (WOD) the aim of which is to highlight the impact of fragility fractures on people’s lives and help give a voice to those living with the ‘silent’ condition.
Each year WOD has a theme and this year ‘The Unbreakable Embrace’ campaign was used to symbolise a continued worldwide solidarity in the fight against fragility fractures.
Jo commented:
“On Thursday last week I was invited to take part in the campaign with the National Osteoporosis Society President Her Royal Highness The Duchess of Cornwall at Clarence House. Other invited guests had also all experienced fragility fractures.
It was an amazing day which started with security checks at the Cleveland Row entrance to St James’ Palace and Clarence House after which we all waited in the house for the Head of the Household to come and brief us. We then moved to the Garden Room of Clarence House which was stunning and filled with family photographs to which you obviously took a second glance as ‘the family’ were all quite recognisable! Tea and biscuits followed (Duchy biscuits obviously) and just as we were starting to snoop around the room HRH entered. We had all been briefed on etiquette and so handshakes, ‘Your Royal Highness’ and small curtseys were all carried out, after which you can call her “Mam as in jam not Ma’am as in arm”. You could tell instantly HRH was passionate about the cause, understandably so as her mother had died of the condition. She was incredibly well informed on the latest research and took great care in asking about each person’s experiences and was genuinely concerned about increasing awareness of the condition. During her upcoming trip to Australia she will be visiting osteoporosis support groups to show her support for cause. HRH and I discussed my experiences and the silent premenopausal epidemic which is building and more specifically my PhD research which provides a patient voice to the previously biomedical and quantitatively dominant research on the condition.
With a cracking sense of humour (excuse the pun) HRH was an absolute pleasure to meet and the official photograph of all of us in an ‘Unbreakable Embrace’ is currently on the World Osteoporosis Day website.”
For more information on the campaign please see their website