About Heart Research UK
Heart Research UK is a vital, key contributor in heart research. The charity was founded by a working heart surgeon in 1967 and is a major provider of funding for research into the prevention, treatment and cure of heart disease. Mr Watson, now retired, but a Trustee of the charity, realised that patients were dying unnecessarily because of the lack of research in heart disease, especially surgical techniques. We fund research projects at hospitals and universities across the UK as well as providing financial support to community-based health promotion projects that focus specifically on the prevention of heart disease through healthy lifestyle. Last year we awarded nearly £ in grants and will be looking to expand our grant making activities in 2005.
Without Heart Research UK many things that we now take for granted, such as heart transplants and heart valves, would not have developed when they did. Even now we are funding groundbreaking research all over the UK, that will benefit thousands and, ultimately, millions of people all over the world.
We funded the first 6 of the 8 heart transplants in Great Britain. Heart Research UK also paid for 4 of the first artificial heart pumps to be implanted and just recently the NHS announced that they would be progressing the programme to full clinical trial with 40 patients. The most successful of our patients, Peter Houghton from Birmingham, has gone from being a dying man to one who has been told he now has many more years to live thanks to the Jarvik valve funded by Heart Research UK and is in the Guinness Book of Records for being the Longest Surviving Person with an Artificial Heart..
Of all our current projects, the Artificial Heart Muscle Project in Leeds, especially, is at the cutting edge of science and will be of worldwide significance. It is a unique project aimed at developing a man-made, mechanical muscle to aid patients with heart failure, financed totally by the generosity of the current supporters of Heart Research UK.
Another project is looking into Hypertrophic Cardiomyopathy which affects sufferers in a great variety of ways. Some people live normal lives, while for others the condition results in limiting shortness of breath and chest pains. For a minority of people the condition may be fatal; in fact HCM is now the commonest cause of sudden non-accidental death in our young people.
Heart muscle is made up of many millions of individual muscle fibres. These fibres are, in the normal heart, arranged side by side and pull together to produce a heartbeat. In HCM these fibres are not aligned properly resulting in an abnormality that can only be seen with microscopic examination through a microscope. Tests can also be made for genetic abnormalities.
Research is working towards new ways of examining how the heart works using sophisticated ECHO machines leading to techniques that can reliably detect family members with genetic abnormalities or will be used to definitely exclude a diagnosis of HCM for people with a family history of the disorder. Our charity has just awarded a specific grant to a University in the North East of England for the development of such screening so the search for a reliable screening method is within our grasp.
Recently Heart Research UK has turned its attention more to prevention, introducing a healthy lifestyle grants programme. We have funded new innovative community projects that focus on decreasing the incidence of heart disease or improving the life of those already affected by Britain’s biggest killer. An initiative giving lifestyle talks in schools has been a great success and the workplace initiative is gaining momentum all the time.
The work of Heart Research UK continues to make our future healthier, safer and full of hope. The charity’s team brims with enthusiasm and ideas and is fast becoming a household name. All we need is continued support to take us on our next step - to double our income in the next two years and put even more resources into saving lives.
Barbara Harpham
National Director
Heart Research UK
Suite12D,
Joseph’s Well,
Leeds LS3 1AB
www.heartresearch.org.uk
0113 234 7474 or mail@heartresearch.org.uk