www.radiolollipop.org
Radio Lollipop believes in the healing power of play – providing smiles and laughter to children at a time when they need it most.
Radio Lollipop gives young patients a voice and a choice during their stay. While they can´t say “no” to taking their medicine or receiving treatment, they can request their favourite songs, win prizes and hear their own voices on the radio. Those activities give youngsters a haven of normality in the hospital day which in other respects is strange, different and often scary.
Radio Lollipop exists in ten UK hospitals, and is also present in the USA and New Zealand.
My first involvement with Radio Lollipop was at my time at Birmingham University when I first met David Mason ( from BBC Pebble Mill ) and Hedley Finn ( Radio Lollipop). The university included a medical school, and the Hospital for Sick Children was just down the road. During my final year at University I got involved with setting up the station, and we used an Alice 828S and a DA switching gadgety gizmo box designed by me.
Overtime, that hand crafted gizmo box became the Lollipop Tardis, and BCD Audio have supplied them ever since.
The first units used Eurocards from our Amplifier system range, packaged into a 2U box.
By 2019 this solution was looking increasingly tired as the only place the Eurocards were being used was here! A 1U single circuit board solution was created and shipped to Radio Lollipop. This retained the features but repackaged in a way that was economical again.
Past Covid, BCD Audio will help and support Radio Lollipop into the future.