IN-FOCUS: Tamworth Have a Heart
FEBRUARY is associated with being the month of expressing matters of the heart because of Valentine’s Day. But did you know it’s also National Heart Month?
Local charity, Tamworth Have a Heart, have been looking after Tamworth hearts since 2016.
Our mission is to make defibrillators publicly available around Tamworth and train people to use them confidently. To date we have successfully installed 74 defibrillators working alongside some very generous, public-spirited members of the public and organisations who donate money in many ways.
One of the trustees, Ben, is featured in a BBC3 documentary. On 13th August, 2017, at the age of only 17, Ben collapsed and went into cardiac arrest, in Tamworth.
Thankfully, due to colleagues performing CPR and using a defibrillator, Ben was successfully brought back to life. It just proves that it can happen to anyone, at any age, at any time.
In fact Tamworth Have a Heart defibrillators were activated five times in January and so far, 10 times in February.
Tamworth Have a Heart have now set themselves the challenge of getting the total number of defibrillators installed to 100. We hope to do this by further fundraising, donations and raising awareness.
We will be at the St George’s Day extravaganza in April and at a community engagement event on Saturday, May 11 in Ankerside shopping centre by Boots.
Here are some interesting facts about the heart: Your heart beats 100,000 times a day. Squeezing a tennis ball tightly demonstrates how hard the heart has to work to pump blood around the body. On average, it takes about 45 seconds for blood to circulate from the heart, all around the body. Every day, your heart creates enough energy to drive a lorry for 20 miles.
For further information or to donate, please visit Tamworth Have a Heart’s website at https:// tamworthhaveaheart.com/ or the Facebook page.