DIG deep and help your favourite free weekly the Citizen build a better world for the sick and dying of Lancashire.

We are appealing to you to help us raise £250,000 for St Catherine's Hospice in Preston to pay for a new day care extension.

Dedicated staff at the Lostock Hall centre care for hundreds of people each year from all over the county - but some have to be turned away because they simply can't accommodate them.

This week work started on a massive project to build a £1.3 million extension enabling the hospice to provide day care for 20 patients per day.

The Hospice already has £360,000 from a Lottery grant and £690,000 which has been brought out of reserves, but it still needs a quarter of a million by spring next year.

Appeals organiser John Nickson denied it was a dangerous move to start building before they had the money to pay for it!

He said: "We are one of only 15 hospices in the UK to receive Lottery support in that round of awards, and we got the fourth highest grant. It shows the confidence the Charities Board has in this scheme - and in our ability to sustain that growth in the future."

And editor of the Preston Citizen Naomi Bunting backed the Brick By Brick Appeal, saying: "Having talked to patients, relatives and staff at St Catherine's, we are pleased to be involved in such a worthy cause.

"We know our readers are generous and we are confident we can help make this dream a reality."

The two-storey development will house treatments rooms for aromatherapy, reflexology, physiotherapy, art therapy and counselling. It will also provide a education centre so that therapists can learn skills and take them out in the community.

St Catherine's cares for patients with a range of life -threatening diseases including cancer, Multiple Sclerosis, Motor Neurone. It currently has only 12 places for day care patients and 18 beds for in-patients.

If you are running a charity event at your school, college, place of work or local society, then do it for the Brick By Brick appeal, call St Catherine's appeals office on 01772 324540 to find out how. And call the Citizen newsdesk on 01772 255522/23 and we'll publicise your fundraising event.

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