Jump start your heart

Residents in Farndon, Cheshire, have raised £4000 for life saving equipment to make the village a safer place for anyone suffering a cardiac arrest.

Community first responders Anita Garwood, Sharon Barclay, Fiona Henderson and Alison Gresty were joined by Jeff's Hair Lounge, The Farndon Public House, GJ Rigby Farndon Chemist, friends and family to take on the ultimate sponsored challenge at Whitchurch Parachute Centre.

Farndon's first responder team leader, Anita said: "We are a group of volunteers who work with the ambulance service by attending emergency calls in the local community, giving life saving treatment to patients before paramedics arrive.

"Our team has a defibrillator - a machine that restarts the heart in some cases of cardiac arrest - that was donated by the ambulance service and we have seen first hand how essential it has been in saving lives.

"The community has been so kind to us in supporting all our fundraising activities so we wanted to give something back, which is why we decided to do a sponsored parachute jump to raise money to buy additional defibrillators to place around the village.

"We hoped to raise enough to buy one more machine but the generous donations from the community mean we can now buy two machines with housing units.

"It will mean that in the event of one of the CFR team not being on duty, there will always be a defibrillator on hand. We will also be giving short courses for anyone that would like to know how to use the defibrillator.

"We also supported other charities such as Help for Heroes, Cancer Research, Brain Tumour Research and Nightingale House."

You can still donate to the 'jump start your heart' challenge at the chemist in Farndon or by contacting the individuals involved.

The T-Shirts worn by all jumpers were designed and paid for by Jeff at the Hair Lounge.