State of a Nation: Heart Valve Disease in Wales

State of a Nation: Heart Valve Disease in Wales

Thursday 19th September 2019

​Thursday was a big day for both Heart Valve Voice and the Global Heart Hub as bot organisations delivered some exciting and impact projects. Heart Valve Voice released their publication of the Welsh State of the Nation Report and delivered a webinar to over 21,000 over 60s and Global Heart Hub welcomed Initiative Herzklappe to the Alliance.

Like the Global Heart Hub, Heart Valve Voice is underpinned by Four A’s, Awareness, Asking, Action and Access and when we looked at the landscape in Wales we realised that the Four A’s were not being delivered to the same standards as other areas in Europe.

Wales is behind many European countries in detection of valve disease and access to treatment. We want to turn the core principles of our charity into formal policy in Wales in order to improve detection and treatment of heart valve disease.

The purpose of the event in the Welsh Assembly next Tuesday is to call on healthcare authorities in Wales to put in place national valve disease guidelines and shine a spot light on where current guidelines miss opportunities in the Gold Standard of Care. We’re taking our Street Doctors with us and we’ll be providing stethoscope tests for Welsh MPs and the public. We’ve seen the effect the Street Doctors have had on increasing awareness and giving people the confidence to ask us about valve disease and it is a tool we will utilise to full effect in Cardiff next week.

We’ll also be discussing the findings of the report and making the Welsh Assembly aware of the impact of valve disease, the situation regarding detection and treatment domestically and compelling them to make heart valve disease a keep aspect of their policy work.

We’re part of an ageing population and as a result of this the number of patients with heart valve disease is expected to grow and grow. We need to look to those who govern in order to improve access to, and awareness of, checks and treatments.

To read more about the report click here.

As Chair of the Global Heart Hub Valve Disease Patient Council I was proud to welcome our newest member, Initiative Herzklapper from Germany. I flew out to Berlin and spoke at the press launch of this new charity. You can read more about that soon!

To round off a frantic day Chris Arden was with us again to present for Heart Valve Voice in partnership with Silversurfers. Chris does brilliant work for us, and the webinar reached over 21,000 people and provided awareness of the symptoms, treatments and management of heart valve disease.

We cannot stress this enough, if you are at all worried about the health of your heart or the heart of someone close to you contact your primary care physician. Take some time to see what Chris discussed here if you want to know more.

We see should see more clinics showing their support over the coming days and we’ll be joined by over one hundred primary schools reading our Children’s book!