By Sheldon Spackman

Raising awareness and funds for cardiac care in Red Deer

Feb 25, 2018 | 1:32 PM

Roughly 200 people came out to support a Cardiac Care Awareness event held at the Krossing in downtown Red Deer Saturday night.

‘Time is Muscle’ featured a dinner, live entertainment, a silent auction and 50/50, all in support of cardiac care at the Red Deer Regional Hospital.

Cynthia De Boer, Marketing and Communications with the Red Deer Regional Health Foundation, says they are the major fundraiser for the hospital, so all proceeds from the event will go towards cardiac equipment at RDRH.

“Right now our hospital lottery is raising funds for patient care beds,” says De Boer. “I suspect that some of the funds will go to patient care beds in cardiology.”

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With the need for a Catheterization Lab in Red Deer top-of-mind for many central Albertans these days, De Boer says that’s not something currently on the table for them.

“AHS hasn’t approved that and as a foundation, we’re unable to fundraise for that,” explains De Boer. “So for now, this group is really interested in awareness for the necessity of a Cath Lab here in Red Deer but the funds will actually be for general cardiac care at our hospital.”

De Boer urges people to contact their respective MLA to make their feelings known about having a Cath Lab in Red Deer.

“They need to attend events like this, they need to possibly even organize events like this,” suggests De Boer. “They need to stay in front of the media and let our government know that a Cath Lab is necessary in Red Deer.”

De Boer adds, she really wants to thank the organizers.

“Many of the cardiac doctors from the hospital and nurses from the hospital and the organizers of course, have been instrumental in organizing this event,” says De Boer. “There’s an incredible amount of things going on right now and I expect that they’ll raise more money than they intended and we really just appreciate very, very much their support.”

Red Deer Mayor Tara Veer and City Councilor Ken Johnston were also among those in attendance Saturday night. Johnston says supporting an event like this is an affair of the heart for him.

“Obviously my wife’s experience and her own death from a cardiac arrest here in Red Deer,” says Johnston. “Also from the ability to come out and support and leverage the efforts of these incredible doctors and hospital professionals that are saying to Red Deer right now that, ‘we deserve more and we deserve better’ and the honour for me is just participating in that particular effort.”

The total amount raised from the event has yet to be released.

Elsewherem one of the Foundation’s biggest fundraisers each year is the Hospital’s Lottery. De Boer says they will be launching that on March 9.

“People can go online right now and buy tickets,” exclaims De Boer. “We have a beautiful Sorento Custom Dream Home on Larratt Close over in Laredo, so we’re very excited to launch that lottery, which will also be fundraising for acute care beds at our hospital.”