Brecon Awareness Day

We had a lovely time at the Bishop's Meadow restaurant in Brecon, meeting people from many of the other services available in Powys to help people who are living with various different conditions. Support to be independent and stay in your own home is so important. We gave out a lot of information on lung conditions and were thrilled to find, at the end of the day, we had sold just over £100 of toys and Christmas cards. British Lung Foundation Wales and Breathe Easy Neath Valley can always find a good use for all the money we raise. All of it is spent helping to raise awareness or in practical ways to help all the people in Wales who are living with a lung condition.

Fire Safety

We can't be too careful where fire is concerned, so, on 19th November, Gary Davies gave us a talk, showed us a film (scary stuff) and lots of helpful hints about how to be as safe as possible from fires in our homes. Lots of common sense and working fire alarms seem to be the best way. I always leave my keys in the doors when I am locked in at night. I have a horror of being trapped inside and not being able to put my hand on the keys, and, this double glazing we all have now, is almost impossible to break.

How not to puff and gasp !

Many apologies - I plain forgot to do the blog in September. We had a quiz which was fun getting the old brain cells working on various bits of trivia.
This month Cath and Chris came along to talk to us. Chris had a lot to tell us about self management of exacerbations - aimed at keeping us out of hospital and catching infections before they make us really ill. Extremely useful information, well worth remembering and taking onboard.
Then Cath reinforced breathing techniques to ease breathlessness and ways to clear the airways when they become blocked.
The main message is "Don't panic, breathe slowly using your diaphragm and wait for things to calm down". This puts us in control of our condition instead of letting it control us, which is what we all want. Then we can enjoy life more.

AGM and a long chat

Once again we have had a successful year, recruiting new members, raising money and campaigning for better services for people living with lung conditions. Following on from our "Meet the Patients" events at the Welsh Assembly, pulmonary rehab is becoming more widespread across Wales. All that lobbying of Am's does pay off.
Chris Mulholland talked to us about the work of British Lung Foundation Wales in improving services with emphasis on early diagnosis for all lung diseases. We also talked about all the Breathe Easy groups, in the Abertawe Bro Morgannwg Health Board area, working together for improved pulmonary rehab services and follow on exercise programmes available to all. If we can achieve that it would be wonderful and a good way to spend the money we have raised over the year.

Margam Park

The craft market in the orangery at Margam Park was a splendid affair. We were there with our awareness stand, dolls and toys, books and frames. All in all a lovely day. We gave out a lot of information to people who came seeking it, made £75 for the British Lung Foundation Wales, recruited two people who would like to abseil with us next Easter and collected loads of signatures on the petition to prevent people smoking in cars where children are present.
Many thanks to our two very able helpers who made sure everything was priced correctly, counted out the correct change and kept our stall neat and tidy.

Visit to the National Botanical Garden of Wales

What a lovely day we had - perfect weather, neither too hot nor too cool, just right in fact. Eleven of us met at the site in Llanarthney in the morning and spent most of the day wandering around the gardens enjoying the plants and the lovely setting.

Meet the Patients at the Welsh Assembly

Yesterday four of us went down to the Welsh Assembly in Cardiff Bay. We shared a minibus with the four from Swansea Bay group. Peter Black was going to talk about the unfairness and difficulties we encounter when travelling by air with oxygen. So I had a long chat with him about my portable oxygen concentrator and how some airlines won't let me use that and want to charge me £100 each way to use their oxygen and I could find myself sitting next to a child with a gameboy or someone with a laptop, both running off the same kind of batteries. To hear the debate follow the link on the right hand side of the page. Select Plenary session on 16th June, then go to item 6, short debate to hear Peter talk on our behalf.
Later we had a long chat with Mick Bates about the fact that there is no rehab in Powys and the unfairness of the lottery of where you live in Wales. He has promised to do something so I have sent him my experience - living on the border of Neath Port Talbot and Powys. NPT has a good rehab service and a team of dedicated respiratory nurses to care for us when we are ill and to advise us on how to stay well.
Bethan Jenkins was very interested to hear of the difficulties of many patients in getting to the locations where rehab is held. This is a problem all over Wales. It is such a rural country with scattered communities and it is very easy to become isolated if you don't drive and you are far away from an infrequent bus route.