Celebrating the life of Karen Lucas 1962-2025

In April 2025 Karen Lucas passed away peacefully at St Catherine's Hospice in Crawley with Kevin and her girls by her side.

Karen was diagnosed with bowel cancer in 2021 and over the last 3 and a bit years there have been times when we thought she had beaten this awful disease, but it just kept coming back.

Throughout Karen's cancer journey there have been several organisations that have made a difference to us as a family and we would like to make a small donation in her memory to each of those. We invite you to contribute to these donations in Karen's memory by making a donation to this page.

Karen's treatment mostly took place at St Lukes Hospital in Guildford, they are supported by the hospital charity. We believe that her oncologist Dr Shelley and the team there did everything they could, and every time the cancer returned they really tried hard to find new ways to fight it.

A clinic in Basingstoke where Karen had a surgery in 2022 called Cytoreductive surgery with HIPEC, widely known as 'The Mother of all Surgeries' because of how extensive it is. We are certain that without this we would have lost her much sooner. This is an NHS clinic supported by charitable donations.

The Bowel Babe fund for CRUK, some of the treatment Karen had was only recently made available on the NHS and only because of the campaigning of Dame Deborah James. Reading about the work they are doing makes us absolutely certain that one day soon, people with the same diagnosis as Karen will have a very different outcome.

Finally and most importantly we would like to make a donation to the wonderful St Catherine's Hospice in Crawley. We as a family will support them going forward. Karen was there for her final 4 weeks and from the moment we arrived a weight was lifted from our shoulders. We'd had a very difficult time trying to get the medications needed to care for her at home. Everyone that works for St Catherine's was wonderful, they looked after the whole family. Kevin was given his own bed and allowed to be by Karen's side 24/7 and our family were blessed with the quality time we never could have had anywhere else. Nothing was too much trouble for St Catherine's and the quality of care surpassed all expectations. Even our dogs Dolly and Dave were able to visit.

If you are unable to support our fundraising efforts, that is absolutely fine.

Karen suggested buying yourself a plant for your garden or house and remembering her when you look at it.

Thank you for keeping Karen in your thoughts and your hearts

Love Kevin, Hollie, Anna and our extended family.