Christmas Dinner

We all met at lunchtime last Wednesday, at the Dyffryn Arms, Bryncoch, for a lovely Christmas lunch. It was great to all be together for a purely social occasion - not that our monthly meetings aren't social events as well as covering some of the more serious aspects. It was the first of our festive events, the next being the Catwg bell ringers, with mince pies and wine.

Legal Details

At our last Breathe Easy meeting on Friday, Janelle and Andrew, from a local legal partnership, talked to us about the many complexities of Living Wills, Power of Attorney and the ever vexing question of who pays for long term care, if and when it is needed. There was an awful lot to take in, all in one go, but if the exchequer is not to gain by getting all your wordly goods, it's something we all have to think about, sooner rather than later.

Trip to the Brecon Canal

On 22nd Septemebr a lot of us joined other Breathe Easy groups for a lovely afternoon, with cream tea, on a canal barge. We joined the barge at the basin in Brecon and then floated gently to the aqueduct, where we could all get out to enjoy the view. And then back we went to Brecon - a lovely peaceful and enjoyable way to spend a day.

Palliative Care and Publicity

Our respiratory nurse, Chris Burrows, gave us a very informative talk about what can be a very emotive subject. Not many of us want to think about end of life, but it is going to happen to all of us, with or without lung disease. We heard about the work of the community nurses, the respiratory team, our GP's, the hospital and hospice care. This is a service which is growing and expanding all the time which is very reassuring.




She and Katrina also joined us to for photographs for the press with the spirometer, smokerlyser and flutter devices that we were able to buy for the team with the money raised from our annual abseil event. These items cost £2,864. Also at todays meeting we were able to give British Lung Foundation Wales a cheque for £3,000 to help them in their work for all people in Wales with a lung condition. So I think we can all be very proud of ourselves to have done so much and to have had so much fun doing it

The Kennedys

Janet John was a mine of information about the goings on in the Kennedy family - they are a soap opera on their own.
We held our AGM and reported a successful year, the group is growing and we were successful in raising over £5,000 from our abseil event and various donations. We bought equipment for the respiratory team at Cimla Hospital, namely a spirometer, a smokaliser and some flutter devices. It was nice to be able to send cheques to both Swansea Bay and Merthyr Tydfil Breathe Easy groups - money raised by them in taking part in our abseil event back in April.

The library service

Bethan Lee came to talk to us about the local library and the wide range of services offered these days - it's far from just books, although they are the main reason I use the library. Did you know in some branches you can play on XBOX or WII ? Not everyone knows about the wide range of large print books available now, or the home service offered. This can be seasonal so if you are housebound in the winter due to bad weather and exacerbations, just call your local library and they will put you in touch with this service. Also you can now browse and order books online and the Oxford English Dictionary is available to all library members. What an amazing service and it's all free too.

Breathe Easy Week 2009

Three of us went to the Welsh Assembly, on Wednesday 17th June, to explain to our AMs the importance of Pulmonary Rehab and we got a chance to see and chat to friends from other Breathe Easy groups accross Wales. Many of the politicians we spoke to said they would write to their LHBs. We know that the service is patchy accross Wales, ranging from good to non existant and that all people with COPD need good rehab to enable them to live with the condition, indeed it is a NICE recommendation that this should be the case.