Saturday 23 January 2016

Tiny Tickers - Heart Week 2016


National Heart Month is in February and we at Tiny Tickers, the baby hearts charity, are asking you to support Heart Week between 7th - 14th February 2016. Heart Week is a chance to join together to help babies born with serious heart conditions by raising vital funds and awareness.


As many as 1 in every 125 babies in the UK has a congenital heart defect. Only one third of major heart defects are spotted during pregnancy, and another third are picked up in standard newborn hospital tests.  Terrifyingly, that means around 1,000 newborns are sent home from hospital every year in the UK with no one realising they are suffering a life-threatening condition.




Tiny Tickers is a small national charity that aims to improve the detection, care and treatment of congenital heart disease (CHD) in babies. Tiny Tickers provides specialist training to health professionals and sonographers so they are better equipped to identify a heart defect during a pregnancy scan. We support parents and families dealing with a diagnosis, and we raise awareness of heart defects in babies so that parents know what signs to look out for. When heart problems are detected during pregnancy, babies get treatment from the first possible moment – and early detection is shown to greatly improve their chance of survival and long-term quality of life, and lowers the risk of side-effects of heart failure such as brain damage. Heart Week will help raise vital funds and awareness for the 1,000 babies who are sent home from hospitals every year with an undetected heart condition. Martha’s condition was thankfully picked up during pregnancy. Her story perfectly explains how lifesaving early detection can be. Meet Martha here. (http://www.tinytickers.org/2016/01/05/marthas-story/)

We have lots of ideas in our Heart Week pack for what you can do to raise vital funds – such as Take Tea for Tiny Tickers and, courtesy of our friends at Swizzels Matlow, the 'Guess How Many Love Hearts in the Teapot' game. Our Heart Week 2016 toolkit has everything you need to get you started and remember - every penny counts so anything you can raise will be gratefully received.
By taking part in Heart Week, you will be playing a vital role in this work so thank you! We are only a very small charity so the impact you can make is huge.



Think HEART
If you are worried your baby is one of these 1,000, these are the 5 signs that will help you protect your baby.
Think HEART points to a range of symptoms that, although non-specific, may be signs of an underlying heart defect - reducing oxygenated blood flow and needing urgent attention:
© Heart rate: too fast or slow? (normally 100 to 160 beats per minute)
© Energy & Feeding: sleepy, quiet, floppy, too tired to feed or falling asleep during feeds?
©Appearance: a pale, waxy, dusky, blue, purple, mottled or grey colour may mean that not enough oxygenated, red blood is getting to the body (normal oxygen saturations are 95-100%)
©  Respiration: breathing too fast or slow? (normally 40-60 breaths per minute)
©  Temperature: cold to touch - particularly hands and feet?


To get your free Heart Week pack, including your Love Hearts 'Guess the Number of Sweets' game, REGISTER HERE Read about Martha's story here  Visit www.tinytickers.org and http://www.tinytickers.org/get-involved/heart-week/

What your support can do

Here is how Tiny Tickers can use the money you raise:

£100  - Provides specialist on-site training for a sonographer to be able to detect heart problems during a pregnancy scan.

£500  - Lets us put information materials about heart conditions in 850 baby clinics and GP surgeries.

£2,500  - Produces a training video into one of the most common forms of heart defect for sonographers to refer to during scans.


For more information please contact Jenni Cowlishaw – Senior Fundraiser; jenni@tinytickers.org / 07894 553 476

Tiny Tickers Registered charity number 1078114 – 76, Chiswick Lane, London W4 2LA

22 comments:

  1. This sounds like such a great cause - I'm sure that all the money raised will be so well used. Good luck with it all (love the idea of how many love hearts in the jar too!)

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    1. They are such a wonderful charity. The work they do is incredible. x

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  2. My friend's baby had a heart defect detected when he was born but was told to go home and come back four weeks later! When they did come back he was rushed straight to Leeds for open heart surgery and remained there for six weeks. I wished something was in place to deal with it when he was first born.

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  3. This is such a worthwhile cause to get behind. My son was born with a hole in his heart which, thankfully, didn't need surgery, but how awful it must be for the families who aren't so lucky.

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    1. They are an incredible organisation. Glad to hear your son was ok and no surgery was needed. I can't begin to imagine how the families must feel. x

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  4. This is a really great cause! Good luck with raising money.

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  5. What an amazing cause and well done on raising awareness, I think its good your letting people know the signs to look out for too x

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    1. They are amazing. I was only too happy to share the work they do x

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  6. It is such a great cause one of the siblings of a boy in Maxi's class had issues and the class raised a lot of money

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    1. aww that is lovely that the class raised money. Well done to them! x

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  7. Such a great cause. I had my third baby recently here in Bavaria and the tests that they do before you go home are incredible. I wish they had the funds to be able to do more at home...

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    1. It would be good if the NHS had the funds for all the relevant testing. Glad to hear you got taken care of xx

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  8. Such a great cause, I hadn't realised there were so many babies born with heart defects.

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  9. Such a great cause.....good luck with fundraising xx

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  10. What an important issue to be raising awareness of - thanks for sharing x

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    1. I was only too happy to share. The work they do is amazing x

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  11. What a great causes. I lost two family members early due to heart problems and if these things are picked up early something could have been done

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    1. They are a wonderful charity. I am so sorry for your loss xx

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