Tain veteran's fundraiser boosts surgery
AN ARMY veteran who struggles with breathlessness took matters into his own hands when he discovered his local medical practice was short of equipment.
Malcolm Peak from Tain, who saw more than 20 years active service, suffers from breathlessness due to a chest complaint.
His doctor regularly uses a spirometer during medical appointments to check the volume of air he is breathing, but Malcolm had noticed that sometimes the apparatus was unavailable due to repairs or it being used by another patient.
Realising the Tain and Fearn Area Medical Practice was in need of another spirometer, he brought up the idea of fundraising for a spare one at a meeting of the Tain Royal British Legion.
He asked his friend and fellow legion member Sadie McGougan to help as she is an experienced community fundraiser and they were joined by another legion stalwart, John Ross.
The trio held a quiz night at Tain’s Masonic Lodge in September which was a flop because only one team turned up.
Undeterred, they decided to hold another quiz night the day before Remembrance Sunday and were delighted to see the hall filled with teams.
Sadie told the Journal this week that they had aimed to raise about £1,700 to cover the cost of the machine and the VAT bill, but near the end of the evening they discovered they were still a few hundred pounds short.
“Malcolm made a little speech about the need for the spirometer and told everyone we still needed a couple of hundred to meet our target,” she said.
“More money then came in from everyone in such a rush that I couldn’t keep count of it and had to recount later. Everyone was really fantastic. Then on Sunday the local fire brigade boys came to the door to hand a £50 donation.”
An extra £310 left over was donated to the legion.
The apparatus was formally handed over to Dr Sandy Gordon and nurse Janie Murray of the medical practice at a presentation at the Masonic Lodge.
“This was all Malcolm’s idea,” said Sadie, who explained her friend can’t walk very far without getting breathless.
“He wanted to buy a spirometer because sometimes when he needed to use it at the practice it was unavailable because someone else was using it or it was in for repair or service. For the number of people that were using it, one wasn’t enough because it was shared between two surgeries.”
Sadie explained the new spirometer would make a big difference to the health centre.
“If they didn’t have one available at the Tain Health Centre the patient would have to go to Raigmore Hospital. But raising that amount of money saves a lot of people having to go all that way to Inverness. It was definitely worth it,” she said.
