A very good friend of mine Andrew Hulkes has in the past 12 months been diagnosed with MSA or Multiple System Atrophy. Here is his story and a link to his JustGiving Page. His fundraising so far has reached nearly £14,000 (as at 30 June 2014). Anything you could spare as a donation would be gratefully received not just by the MSA Trust and Andrew, but by the many other people who will benefit from the use of this machine in the future. This will benefit the people of Essex. Please pass this on to as many people as you can, if everyone donates just £1 I’m sure we can soon reach the magic target and start helping Andrew and others. Thank you, Peter.

https://twitter.com/savs147/status/483636429931962368

Andrew’s Story
I am asking for your help to raise £25,000 that being the cost of buying, importing and installing a GigerMD in the UK and training staff to operate it. You don’t have to promise all of that yourself of course, but anything, anything at all that you can give would make a tremendous difference not only to me, but to anybody who has a neurological condition of any sort. And that’s an awful lot of people who would be immensely grateful to you.

I have developed a rare medical condition known as MSA – a neurodegenerative disease that medical science can’t yet cure, treat or even slow down. Basically, MSA just munches away at one’s nervous system until there is nothing left to munch. At which point, you lose. I have had symptoms for several years but have now reached the point where working is no longer feasible.

While medical science can’t cure MSA, the GigerMD machine helps the body to reassign healthy nerve tissue to replace tissues damaged or destroyed by accident or disease. It’s not a cure, because eventually the body runs out of healthy nerve tissue to convert, but it is a way of making the very best use of what one has. Stoke Mandeville Hospital have one of the only machines in the public domain in the UK, and their Clinical Director recently wrote to me to say: “we find the GIGER to be an extremely useful part of the ongoing maintenance for health for people with neurological disability.”

I mentioned the GigerMD to Benfleet Physiotherapy, the neuro-physiotherapy practice that I attend and they, having consulted with numerous senior practitioners, were very enthusiastic about the device. So much so they agreed that if we could raise the money to buy one, they would locate it within their practice and not only offer therapy to MSA sufferers free of charge, but also provide rehabilitation services to anyone suffering with a neurological condition.

Quite apart from the treatment angle, there is also the possibility that the data obtained from treatment would have a value in MSA research, an area that needs much more support.

This is probably the most cost effective project I’ve ever been involved with. We can make a real difference to the lives of people who, up until now, have only been told there’s nothing that can be done for them. That’s got be worthwhile.

Thank you,
Andrew Hulkes