10 Year Anniversary of the Little Princess Trust Hair Loss Charity

One of the UK’s most kind-hearted and best-loved charities which helps youngsters with hair loss is celebrating a big year in 2016.

The Little Princess Trust, which was set up by the parents of Hannah Tarplee, a Hereford schoolgirl and the original “Little Princess” who lost her life to cancer in 2005, is marking its 10th anniversary. In a special posting about the milestone year on the charity’s website, they reveal that they have now provided free, real-hair wigs to more than 4,000 children.

Patchy hair loss

The recipients have usually lost their hair during cancer treatment  chemotherapy drugs frequently cause hair to fall out or to the autoimmune disorder Alopecia Areata, which leads to patchy hair loss, which can sometimes be quite severe. Sister conditions Alopecia Universalis and Alopecia Totalis are more extreme still, resulting in total baldness. Naturally, the charity’s wigs have been a godsend to the children who received them during such a difficult time in their lives.

The charity has recently launched two initiatives for 2016, the first being a social media campaign based around the hashtag #HairToSpare. “We are encouraging supporters to donate LONG lengths of hair through the #HairToSpare campaign,” they write. “If supporters have no #HairToSpare, then hopefully they will make a small money donation instead.”

Whilst donating hair to the charity is crucial, the cost of making them into wigs and purchasing some specialist wigs - such as those made from afro hair which cannot be donated - means that monetary contributions are equally as welcome.

Applications for funding

As well as this, the charity has announced that it is now inviting applications for funding from academics and organisations involved in researching the causes of paediatric cancer.

Wendy Tarplee-Morris, a Trustee and co-Founder of the charity said, “When we initially started the charity we spoke of how wonderful it would be if one day there wouldn’t be a need for an organisation of this kind. I could never have imagined that 10 years later we would be able to fund research which might one day help lead to achieve that.”