Hello everyone,
I’m Steph from the Community team, I hope you don’t mind me posting here today. I’m hoping to gather your thoughts and opinions on developing the ‘living with incurable cancer group’.
We’d like to make it easier for new members to write that first post, whilst retaining a safe space for members to continue expressing their emotions and most difficult thoughts. We know that some of you also want a space to chat more generally and give and get support around everyday life.
Firstly, I’ll be explaining a little more about the changes we could make in the group and what those changes mean for you. Following this information, there will be a poll where you’ll have a chance to have your say. We’d also welcome any thoughts or comments in reply to this post below.
We have been developing some groups across the Community to have two or three separate sections, or forums, within each group. Many of our groups now look a little more like this:
Underneath the new sections, we still show ‘all discussions’ from the whole group in a combined feed, just like you see now.
When we add forums to a group, you can still start a discussion in the same way. The only real difference is the option of which forum to post in (see below). Everything else works exactly as it does now.
If you would like to take a look at this group structure, why not take a look at the breast cancer or bladder cancer groups, where you'll be able to see this group structure working.
We expect to see benefits to new members in providing a dedicated space for them to introduce themselves. Existing members should be able to more easily find discussions around diagnosis and treatment, whilst enjoying a space to continue longer chats and discuss everyday life, and give and get support.
We understand that change can be difficult, so we wanted to find out what you, the existing members of the group, thought about developing the group in a similar way.
We're constantly working on the user experience on the site, as making the Community the best place for peer-to-peer cancer support is at the heart of everything we do. We are continually listening to feedback and making changes to the site which will improve the experience for all our members and make sure everyone can access the right support for them, when they need it.
If you have any questions or comments about the new group structure, we would love to hear from you. You can vote in the poll, reply below or contact us by email at community@macmillan.org.uk
Thank you for taking the time to comment Gragon and Norberry
The new structure is not intended to restrict conversations in any way. For example, you are still very welcome to chat in the diagnosis and treatment section where the discussion results in a longer conversation.
We've told members not to worry if they're not sure where their post fits, it's just a general guide.
Sometimes members tell us that they really appreciate the chance to chat about everyday life, away from other cancer discussions. Although there are groups in the Community for general chat, we've found that most members prefer to stay within their groups with their friends. Adding separate forums to the group is the ideal way to offer a separate space for those kind of chats, within your own groups.
That's not to say you can't chat across all the forums. If your post is about treatment, then you would post there and continue the conversation for as long as you wanted. However if you wanted to chat about 'three good things' or 'gardening and plants', for example, these threads would ideally be started in the chat section.
We also are very open to feedback about the number of forums and what you'd like to call them. It doesn't have to be those three forums, if you feel a different structure would work better for this group.
I hope this explains it a little more - would you let me know if this explanation changes how you feel at all Gragon and Norberry?
Hi ownedbystaffies - thanks for this. It's a good suggestion for the EOL group, as we could include this as a sub category within this group now, as opposed to it's own individual space. We would then also have the option to hide the forum threads from appearing on the main discussions list. We didn't have that option before, which I remember was a particular concern for some.
You are right though, we need to review this again now and understand whether it's a useful space still and if so, how that fits into this group, or whether it becomes it's own space. We will look at this as soon as we can.
Best wishes,
Ellen
Best wishes,
Ellen
Macmillan Community Team
Hello ellie 73
Thank you so much for also finding the time to comment.
I wondered if there was anything we could do to help you use the Community again? We understand that changes can feel difficult, but we wondered which of the changes were stopping you from using the Community regularly? We've made quite a number of fixes recently and we've got more improvements coming really soon. You can read more about those improvements here.
It's interesting that you feel that the group is quieter. I just checked the stats from January/February of the last few years and found that the group has been much busier this Jan/Feb than it has been for the past few years:
Living with incurable cancer group
Jan/Feb 2019 – 1341 posts and replies
Jan/Feb 2020 – 1191 posts and replies
Jan/Feb 2021 - 1833 posts and replies
In the last three months, the number of active members has gone up by 50% and it's clear to see that activity in the group has increased.
I really hope there's something we can do to help, as we want to continue being there for you, ellie 73. It sounds like some of our other members miss you being here too.
We'd be more than happy to help you with anything you're having problems with.
