It's a fair cop!

Congratulations to Cat Pawlikow, age 29, who has CF and who works for Northumbria Police as a Community Support Investigation Officer. She just won the award for Outstanding Staff Member of the Year! Cat's job involves investigation of arrest packages, interviewing and charging prisoners, preparing files for court, obtaining statements, self-defence courses, first aid, drugs analysis and whole range of other skills. Well done Cat and keep up the good work!

The Big Cake Bake!

This year's CF Fundraising Week is 17-23 May and we have a special theme this year....The Big Cake Bake!

We all love cake, whether it's a victoria sponge, carrot cake or a cupcake and we want you to use cakes to help raise funds for the CF Trust. Whether it's a coffee morning or a cake sale all you need is a venue, generous slices of cakes and cookies, plenty of liquid refreshment and generous guests! You can host your event during CF Fundraising Week or at a time convenient to you earlier or later in the year.

Your guide to The Big Cake Bake is now available, along with posters and invitations, please contact our Events Team for a fundraising pack on 0300 373 1100 or email events@cftrust.org.uk - don't forget to include your name, address, postcode and a contact number - and you can get baking to help see off CF!

Find out more at www.cftrust.org.uk/help/nationalcampaigns/thebigcakebake

Employee of the month?

Lots of CF Trust employees do their bit outside of work hours to help raise funds for our vital research. Andrew Moran from Donations Support (He's the one on the far right in the photo above) told us a bit about what he is doing for the CF Trust this April.


My name is Andrew; I work on the Donations Support Team here at the Cystic Fibrosis Trust. For the last four years I’ve worked with my colleagues sending out what I would imagine to be thousands of thank you letters to all our lovely fundraisers and supporters. It’s a very rewarding job and I’ve always enjoyed working on the team.

My not-so-secret passion outside of work has always been live music. I started learning drums at school and since then I’ve been lucky enough to play all over Europe in various bands.

Recently I was given the opportunity to combine my two great interests by playing a gig in aid of the Trust. My current band Not Cool have been kindly asked by charity gig promoters Positive Action to play one of their fundraisers on April 3rd, nominating The Cystic Fibrosis Trust as their charity of choice for this particular concert

Over the last year Positive Action has raised hundreds of pounds for charities like Shelter and U-Turn. They recently held a very successful benefit concert for those affected by the earthquake in Haiti.

We’ll be joined by our friends Chapter Sweetheart on the night, and we are actually releasing a limited edition CD just for the gig featuring a couple of tracks by both bands. The venue will be the Victoria pub in Mile End, the premier music venue in that area, and all of the proceeds taken on the door (a cheap as chips £3 will get you) go to the Trust.

I’ll be honest – As you can imagine from our name my band is a bit noisy and may not be to everyone’s taste. But if you’d like a great Saturday night out at a good live music venue with a friendly atmosphere, and fancy raising some money for the Trust in the process, then please come along. Remember to come and say hello, it would be great to ‘place a face’ to some of the wonderful letters I get to read!

www.myspace.com/notcoolisaband
www.myspace.com/chaptersweetheart
http://www.myspace.com/thevictoriae3

Fancy abseiling for the CF Trust?

We have three different abseils happening in the UK this spring and we'd love you to join us for one of them - it's a great adrenaline rush and a fantastic challenge.

Invest NI, Belfast, 13 March - 160ft abseil down this most impressive building

Manchester United FC, 28 March - 140ft free air abseil from the roof of the North Stand

Celtic Football Club, 2 & 3 April - 100ft free air abseil from the South Stand

If you're interested visit www.cftrust.org.uk for more details or contact our Events Team on 0300 373 1100 or events@cftrust.org.uk

Does my bum look big in this?!

In more unusual fundraising news 16 year old Kristian Long organised a Sumo Wrestling Competition for his teachers. The students of Plume School, Maldon Essex had to pay to watch the teaching staff compete against each other and the event raised over £240 for the CF Trust. Well done Kristian...and the teachers for taking part in less than flattering outfits!

Max and his mankini

We had to blog about one of our very special fundraisers - 16 year old Max Richardson who spent Sunday walking up Southend High Street in a very fetching lime green mankini to raise money for us. Well done Max!

http://www.justgiving.com/maxmankini

Oxygen on flights

Many of you will be turning your mind to planning your summer holiday, in an attempt to get away from this winter gloom. We often see the topic of troublesome travel insurance discussed, with those with CF often dreading the prospect of hours on the phone to travel insurance companies facing hefty premiums and multiple refusals; but have you thought about whether you’re going to need supplementary oxygen when jetting off to sunnier climes?

A proportion of people with Cystic Fibrosis need supplementary oxygen when flying, due to the oxygen levels in the cabin dropping at high altitude. Charges for what is an essential for many, vary greatly, with some airlines such as BA, Cathay Pacific, Emirates, Thomson and Virgin all supplying free oxygen on the advice of a doctor; but others enforcing hefty charges of up to £500 per trip. A quarter of all airlines recently contacted by PHA-UK * do not supply supplementary oxygen at all.

Having done a spot of our own ‘secret shopper research’ we were disappointed not just with the costs some airlines enforce, but at the attitudes of airline employees when trying to arrange the oxygen. Extended periods of time were spent on hold, and some airlines claimed to simply ‘not know’ what to do about getting supplementary oxygen on a flight!

Together with the PHA-UK and the British Lung Foundation, we are working to change this situation. To help, please sign this petition.

*PHA-UK stands for Pulmonary Hypertension Association-UK