A TERMINALLY-ILL woman charged friends a fee to come to her birthday party - to raise funds for a hospital.

Pauline Martin asked her pals not to buy presents for her 60th birthday, but instead to buy a ticket for the party, with the money raised going towards the radiotherapy training and development fund at Middlesbrough's James Cook University Hospital.

Ms Martin, from Brotton, has incurable cancer of the pancreas, which was diagnosed last year.

She attends the Middlesbrough hospital for regular scans and injections and said: "My 60th birthday was coming up and there wasn't much I wanted really.

"I had decided I was going to have a big party so I thought, why not charge everyone £3.50 for coming and raise some money for cancer care?"

About 250 people attended the party which, coupled with other events including a coffee morning, raffles and disco, organised with her friends, has raised £2,200 for the fund.

Ms Martin said: "I'd really like to thank everyone for being so generous. Without their support we couldn't raise the money we did for such a worthy cause - and I did still get some nice presents.

"I've had marvellous support from my family, friends and the hospital - I get good days and bad days but I've a good life and my philosophy is to get on with it."

Dr Nick Wadd, a consultant clinical oncologist, said: "It's a fantastic amount of money, and we're extremely grateful to