Congenital Heart Awareness Day - Birmingham
What do you think of when someone mentions the 14th February? Valentine's Day? Romance? Flowers? Hearts, perhaps...? Well, 14th February is also International Congenital Heart Disease Awareness Day so perhaps you wouldn't be too far off the mark.
Last year, it was suggested by GUCHs that GUCH PA should organise something for Congenital Heart Awareness Day 2007, so that we could mark the day as the children's charities and the American equivalent of GUCH do. A small team pulled together some of the ideas and created two main strands for the day: an awareness element based around the GUCH clinics and also a social event where GUCHs could meet and share their experiences.
The GUCH Volunteers made clinic visits the length and breadth of the UK, from Plymouth to Glasgow. GUCHs went in with the specially designed leaflets, balloons and told GUCHs about what we, as an organisation, can provide to support them.
Even at some of the big centres, where we thought we were well known, our new posters and the fact that we were actually there in person caught the interest of people who’d never heard of us. A lot were interested in our website, so we can look forward to a lot more people visiting and signing up for the messageboards.
The highlight of the social event was a walk arranged in central Birmingham (in the “heart” of England) to mark the day: raising awareness, exploring the city and offering the chance for GUCH patients to meet each other and socialise.
So, on Saturday 17th February a motley band of GUCH patients, staff, family and friends met up at St Philip's Cathedral for an exploration of the city of Birmingham. The weather was kind to us and though it was a little chilly there was no rain or snow. All in all we had 20 people walking around the streets in a range of bright yellow tabards, holding GUCH balloons – filled with Helium at Clinton's - and generally enjoying the sights of Birmingham. The outfits may not have been flattering but were certainly excellent for raising awareness, with the balloons proving surprisingly popular with some Goth teenagers we encountered.
We split into two groups and headed off for our walks. One group took a shorter walk around the central area, calling at Symphony Hall, Centenary Square, stopping for a coffee and admiring the fine architecture of Birmingham's industrial heyday. The other group headed out on a longer tour, including an exploration of the canals, locks and the Jewellery quarter, not to mention showing an interest in graveyard catacombs. Those people who didn't know Birmingham were favourably impressed with the place.
At the end of the walks we all returned to the Priory Rooms on Bull Street, where a very welcome buffet lunch was awaiting us. Plenty of talking - and eating - went on and it was particularly good to meet some new people who hadn't been to a GUCH event before.
As usual with any GUCH event, but particularly for this co-ordinated series of events in a short period of time, many people gave up hours of their time to organise and get to the right place at the right time, but particular mention has to go to Paul Willgoss, without whose inspiration and hard work we wouldn't have had an event at all, and to all those who trekked across the country to join us in Birmingham on a Saturday.
Anyone with ideas for next year's event please contact the office as suggestions are actively being sought.
Elizabeth Connolly |
