Velo Birmingham & Midlands 2019! The 100 mile closed road ride will be back on Sunday 12 May 2019. Leaving from Birmingham City Centre and travelling through Solihull, Warwickshire, Coventry, Dudley & Sandwell and ending up back in Birmingham City Centre.By riding in Velo 2019 you can help to support patients, families and staff at our hospitals, funding equipment, research and facilities.

Two years ago my brother, John, was admitted to Heartlands Hospital for a stem cell transplant, following 14 months of chemotherapy at Good Hope Hospital for Multiple Myeloma, a blood cancer.  Following the transplant, things took a turn for the worse and, having already contracted sepsis, he then suffered heart failure.  It took a team of 15 medical professionals over 30 minutes to resuscitate him via CPR, before he was transferred to ITU and put into a medically-induced coma.  He was on life support for 2 weeks, with kidney failure, two minor strokes and possible brain damage as a result of the cardiac arrest and immediately contracted a second life-threatening infection.  The prognosis was extremely poor.  To complicate matters, as a result of being intubated for 2 weeks, John also ended up paralyzed.  Fortunately, with a lot of medical intervention and subsequent physiotherapy, John made a slow recovery and gradually learned to walk and talk again.

It was several months before John was able to go home and, after the implementation of various aids around the home in the early days, and regular motor-based learning and exercise from the physiotherapy team, he has made a significant recovery.  This support network continues today.

To me, as his brother, the staff at Heartlands were more than professional.  They were kind and compassionate and shared an empathy for the whole family, particularly his wife, as cancer is a shared journey.  Without the support network of the staff at both Heartlands and Good Hope, I don’t know how John and our family would have made it through this experience.

A while ago I talked to John about ‘giving back’ to the hospital to show our appreciation for the way they’ve helped the whole family.  The Birmingham Velo is an ideal opportunity to give back to the ‘sharing, caring’ professionals, so please give generously for now and for the future.

Mark Taylor