My Chosen Charity - Nick

Fundraiser: 

Nick Collins

My page: http://uk.virginmoneygiving.com/NickCollinsHRUK

Hello!!

As you may know by now due to my constant blog postings that myself and a few friends are competing in an event this year which will take us 208 miles through the alps of Germany, Austria and Italy.......oh we're running it!!
It's called the Transalpine event http://www.transalpine-run.com/alps_cross_start.htm , staged over 8 days, completing in essence a marathon each day........I bet you're thining that sounds fun right?!! haha
We weren't originally going to raise funds for chairty as we're doing this event entirey for our own "fun", yet it became apparent quite quickly that the one thing people kept asking us other than 'are you mad?' was in fact 'who are you rising money for?'
Aside from this charity page that I have set up, we also have one set up to sponsor the BHF (British Heart Foundation). So you may be thinking why is it that I have choosen Heart Research UK as well?
Here's my answer :-)
The people that know me well know that I lost my Dad back in 2005. Reason being due to heart failure      (cardiomyopathy).

During his care he had what is know as an LVAD (left ventricluar asisst device) implanted into his body. This is a machine that is inserted internally allow the blood flow that normally goes through your heart to be rerouted to go through the LVAD. The aim of this machine is to allow the heart to rest and possibly start to show signs of recovery within the affected areas of the heart. 

If you have never seen this device attached to a person you don't quite get the full scope of what it is and the impact it has on a persons life albeit trying to prolong it. The machines power source comes from either a machine you plug into the mains at home or by battery packs you're to wear. In order to do this a drive line had to come from the LVAD and out through the abdominal wall of my Dad. It's a very invasive piece of kit to have but on the other side of the coin it is a genius piece of engineering.

The LVAD gave me the opportunity to spend precious moments with my Dad that I will always remember and be grateful for.

He showed immense strength of mind, body and character when he was going through his treatment, which is something I can only hope to emmulate come September for my event.

This continuing research will give other people and their families in the situation that Dad and my family were in, the opportunity to not only prolong their lives in the short term but make a full recovery.

Sadly I can't have this for my Dad but hold comfort in knowing that it could be possible for others.

If you are gracious enough to donate to this cause I would be truely thankful.

Nick

xx

Harefield Heart Science Centre

Dr Paul Barton, National Heart and Lung Institute, Imperial College London

 

Heart failure recovery

The research team at Harefield Hospital has developed a new treatment whereby patients on LVAD support also received heart failure therapy drugs – drugs that would normally not be given at this stage of the disease. This has led them to find that with the right drug combination certain groups of patients actually get better. Over two-thirds of patients with dilated cardiomyopathy who were enrolled into the programme responded well to the therapy. Over time their hearts started to work well again and following treatment it was possible to remove the LVAD and for them to return to normal life.

 

Little is known about how recovery of the heart occurs in these patients. In order to understand more, the team has been studying samples taken from the heart when the LVAD is implanted and other samples taken after treatment. They found a number of changes in gene activity which may contribute to the recovery process. However, a key question which remains is why certain patients respond well to treatment while others, with the same signs and symptoms, do not and still need a transplant. This project aims to directly address this question by using state-of-the-art gene expression analysis tools to look for differences in the molecular make up of the hearts of patients in these two groups. It is thought that identifying such differences will lead to a better understanding of heart failure. This will pave the way for tests to determine which patients are likely to recover and should therefore be considered for these pumps earlier.  Also, the findings may contribute to the development of future drug treatments to reverse heart failure

Pre-Jubilee weekend in the Lakes

The Queens Jubilee celebrations are upon us and being based in London it is clear to see that there is going to be one big party coming up. I have to say that its good to see people openly patriotic and celebrating what is a great country.
I've added my own twist to things by getting the bands surrounding the brackets on my braces coordinated in red, white and blue....like to mix it up a bit don't I!
For us four blokes this weekend we are most definitely running up a few his in the lake district. This will be my first trip to what has been described as a stunning place, I fully expect to be looking at the floor when im knackered!

The plan for the trip is along the same lines as Snowdonia in that will be on our feet for 7hrs  give or take a few minutes in order for us to get it in our....actually my thick head that you just have to keep going!

Dave, JK and myself went for a cheeky 10 miler this past Sunday and guess what!?

I felt absolutely rubbish from 6 miles in which was as much a shock the system as the heat that we were running in.
Due to that I have no idea what this weekend is going to feel like......painfully interesting springs to mind!

on a non running theme I have a new toy to keep me more efficient with my blog posts.... introducing my Sony S Tablet (im writing this post using it)

As it allows an SD card to be used with it, I can link all the videos and photos from our training straight away. My main reason for having this Tablet is come the event I will be able to give updates stage by stage which I find quite exciting! It's the little things that count!

Here's to the weekend!

FUNDRAISING!! British Heart Foundation

Hi all!

Most, if not all the people that we know have been calling us mad for entering into this years GORE-TEX Transalpine event, yet smiling when they say it thinking about the pain and discomfort that we'll be going through as we make our way through the Alps from September 1st-8th.

A common theme that we have all had when talking to people about what it is we're doing is 'what charity are you doing it for?'

Originally we weren't actually going to do it for a charity. Jamie sums up on our charity page why we entered really well.

'We all wanted something to test ourselves with, something for us to aim for and something that will bring out the best in us'

If you have read my posts you can already see the effect it is already having on me going through the training.

Through the generosity of yourselves we are wanting and hoping that our collective efforts can make a change for those people who are in great need of it.

With the ever so recent events involving Bolton's Fabrice Muamba and London Marathon runner Claire Squires it is key that Heart research and it's applications are things that affect a lot of people.

Our Donation page can be reached via this link;

www.virginmoneygiving.com/team/fourblokesandafewhills

If I can ever figure out how!, I will add a direct link on the blog.

All the best to you all.

Nick, JK, Dave & Staff

Snowdonia Weekend - Sunday 6th May (4 miles and 10 pints)

After our efforts on Day one and the long blog entry prior to this one that you will see, this entry is somewhat shorter!!

We had a little longer sleep this time round to recover from the running and beer combo from the previous day and all started out ok. We checked over are aches - in Dave's case it was cuts and bruises!
I think that you'll agree that in this picture it may well be the strangest looking leg you have ever seen!

I, much to my own surprise felt pretty good. Only niggle I had was in my left ankle where I landed funny and compressed the front of the joint.
We all got our gear ready and set out yet about thirty seconds into that Staff commented that his left knee was giving him some jip, which is not uncommon with us on our runs as I am sure most long distance runners have experienced - sometimes you just hurt but you get on with it anyway.

Having a sports therapy background helped me to realise pretty quickly that we could be in for a short days work. Staff's mobility was non existent and the pain getting increasingly worse for him, which did involve us mocking him slight for being a tart! If he ever writes on here he can give you the run down in more detail of what was going through his head at the time.

We had found our route.......

Random old house crushed by a tree....good photo opportunity!

As we gently warmed up it was clear on Staff's face that he was both struggling and feeling gutted that he was holding us back but as we said to him ' we're a team, injuries happen, we aren't leaving you'
Honourable aren't we ay!!

To be fair I think we were all secretly thinking that this could be a good reason to get to the pub earlier haha

We were going through a wooded area when it came time to strap Staff's leg to try help him out....the poor boy was hobbling around like Jake the peg!

For the record, I din't take this picture...shoddy work!!

What was funny when I was helping strap him up was the fact that he was stripped down to his pants, leaning over to only have a lady walk up behind him in some shock at the sight! "oooo wasn't expecting that" she said haha............I'm sure she loved it really.

We knew our day was coming to a brief conclusion yet it didn't stop us messing about somewhat...........

boys will be boys!!.........or is it just us??

Just so you know, we made it safely back to the pub and drank plenty of this...

In all we had a great weekend, next stop being the lake district 1st - 4th June.

Nick
No Regrets.