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On a soft spring evening in mid-April CRY embarked on its most high profile event to date when we invited all MP's
t o a Parliamentary Reception in the Palace of Westminster to launch our CRY Centre for Sports Cardiology. We had cross-party support for the reception which was hosted by MPs Dr Julian Lewis, Dr Ashok Kumar and David Chidgey. The response was astonishing.
A packed room heard Yvette Cooper, Public Minister of Health pay tribute to CRY and the work we do and make the exciting announcement that we had been selected as one of the charities to support, for the development of our Counselling Programme, with a Section 64 Grant award of £105,000 over 3 years. These grants are highly coveted and have over the years become increasingly stringent in their requirements so we are hugely proud that our application was successful.
Dr Liam Fox, Shadow Secretary of State for Health also spoke and told of how, when I first talked to him about CRY he was pleased to get involved because he had personal experience of tragedies such as we were highlighting, through the sudden death of an ex girlfriend’s young brother. He said how as a student at university,
 he would never forget the shock he felt, this being the first young person he had ever known to die. Dr Fox congratulated us on our work and accepted the donation of a CNett 2000+ Ambulatory ECG machine from Cardionetics on behalf of the CRY Centre for Sports Cardiology.
The purpose of the evening was to draw people together from the world of politics, medicine and sport - an unusual mix - who had an interest in CRY's work and could help us move forward. One of the most significant comments I received after the evening was from a top cardiologist who told me he came as a cynic and left converted to our aims. Part of the success of the evening was undoubtedly due to the introduction of 2 new publications - a Parliamentary Reception leaflet ( an update of which is included with this mailing) and a 100 page booklet on CRY's Contribution to Research. This collated most (though not all!) of the research that Professor McKenna, Dr Sanjay Sharma, Dr Greg Whyte and Dr Sam Firoozi have had published as a result of our screening programme and also included Dr Hugh Sharp's prize winning essay for the coveted MOSA Hunter Prize on the first CRY ECG Testing in Millfield School.
 We were very proud to have on display for the first time our new Power Point presentation, donated by Steve Parker, Vice President of A. T. Kearney's, which included an animation of conditions that effect the heart. What tremendous support Steve and consultant Pierluigi Bongiorno gave us for this important event.
The response of Parliamentarians to our invitation was remarkable and I would like to take the opportunity of particularly thanking Jeff Morland, Chair of Labour Party North, for doing so much to raise awareness of CRY with MPs in the face of his own terrible tragedy. Jeff and Sandra contacted CRY after their 22 year old son Levon died unexpectedly in January from Wolfe Parkinson White.
It was fantastic to welcome so many VIPs, including the Chief and Deputy Chief Executives of the British Olympic Association, leading cardiologists, prominent medics, representatives from the major sports industries and organisations, and sports celebrities. Also our team of technicians without whom our screening programme could not take place - and have the opportunity of rolling back the years and meeting up again with Annette Jones who I reminded, - between her tears! - of how she sacrificed her precious commission on the Acuson echocardiogram machine that we donated to Professor McKenna's clinic in 1995, and how her contribution enabled CRY to purchase this, our first piece of medical equipment. Annette is one of the top echocardiographers in the country and donated her time free to CRY for the first 4 years when we initially piloted our screening programme in 1993.
Launching our CRY Centre for Sports Cardiology and raising awareness of CRY's achievements was the goal on the night. Victoria Lambert, Health Editor of the Daily Telegraph was amongst the guests and this newspaper did a superb article on Sandra Armstrong’s tragedy, highlighting CRY's work that was published the opening day of the British Cardiac Society annual conference giving us tremendous publicity for our programme.
My prime disappointment was that numbers were so tight that only a few CRY personnel could attend. I do hope that by including our leaflet for you, and as many photos of the evening as we dare, you will all feel part of this important event which your loyalty and support over the years has made possible.
It was with a great sigh of relief that I learned we were finally successful with our application for a Section 64 grant. Our second group of Skills course students had successfully completed their training in March and the next stage of our Theory course, combining the first 2 Skills groups was due to start in May. We had been unable to get funding for this training and so the government grant which will now cover all students for the Theory and 2 year Diploma Course, + next years new group of Skills students was timely indeed!
Our Parliamentary Reception, on Monday April 15th, immediately followed a frenetic Marathon weekend. CRY's Marathon Reception was held again in the Brittannia Hotel and vigourously supported by many of our CRY runners and some CRY families who came especially to meet us. It was terrific that CRY Trustee and Consultant Cardiologist Dr Sanjay Sharma and his family also came to wish everyone well for The Big Run. Robi and Kate Fox offered to be our "official photographers" for the event and did an amazing job identifying and taking some superb photos of most CRY runners at various spots on the 26 ½ mile track.
The innovative highlight of the day (and much envied by other competitors) was in offering free leg massages to our intrepid athletes. Our 2 professional reflexologists were much in demand as they soothed and broke down knots in gnarled and aching leg muscles which some experienced participants told us enabled them to leave for home with a smile instead of the usual anticipated grinding agony.
This years marathon was our biggest ever with over 100 runners including 14 CRY hearts and we hope to achieve our goal of raising £100,000 (Gross) to enable us to continue the development of our very ambitious programme. It is particularly important to thank our robust team of CRY heart runners who do so much to get CRY noticed on the day. These super costumes again attracted the
 attention of live TV when Neil Ditch was interviewed with famous athlete Sally Gunnell and able to raise awareness of CRY.
Finally we are very proud to have the opportunity to introduce our new Patron Rob Jones MBE from Trebanos, near Swansea in Wales. Rob - capped 54 times for Wales; Captain of the Barbarians; 3 Lions Tours; 3 World Cups - is widely believed to rank amongst the finest and most popular scrum-halves the game has known. Rob responded to a request to support CRY, from his neighbour Paulette Smith, whose 24 year old son Christiaan died suddenly in 1999. Rob said how devastated the whole community was by the tragedy and how delighted and honoured he was to be given the opportunity of becoming a Patron. Thank you Rob for becoming a part of the CRY team.
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