Thanks for taking the time to visit my JustGiving page.

Very sadly my mum passed away on 9 October 2014 at the age of 58 as a result of contracting vasculitis.  She was a loving mum, wife, sister, nanny and friend and will be missed greatly.

She spent the last 7 weeks of her life in hospital suffering from this awful illness.  It caused her to have terrible lesions on her legs which resulted in her being bedridden. During her time in hospital the vasculitis spread to numerous organs and ultimately her heart, which caused her to die suddenly.

Vasculitis is difficult to identify but if it is spotted early it can be treated and sufferers can go on to lead a normal life. It was not identified early in Mum's case and even one week prior to her death we hoped she would recover.

As a family we have decided that fundraising to help with researching into how to identify and treat vasculitis is really important to us. Vasculitis UK has been a charity since 1992 and we feel is a very worthy cause. For her funeral we have asked friends and family wishing to send flowers to donate to Vasculitis UK instead. We hope that our fundraising will help research into this little known disease.

The aims of Vasculitis UK are (from www.vasculitis.org.uk):

• To support those suffering from vasculitis diseases and their families by providing information and advice.
• To inform and educate those with vasculitis about their illness so that they are empowered to take greater control of it.
• To work with other organisations and medical professionals to improve the recognition, diagnosis and treatment of vasculitis diseases.
• To raise awareness of vasculitis disease among medical professionals and the general population.
• To enable vasculitis sufferers to contact others with vasculitis.
• To encourage and support the formation and development of local vasculitis support groups.
• To support research into the causes and effects of vasculitis and into improvements in the diagnosis of vasculitis and into treatment of people suffering from different types of vasculitis.

Vasculitis UK depends entirely on voluntary donations and fundraising to raise the income needed to continue its work. Because the organisation is run entirely by unpaid volunteers, with no offices or overheads, the admin and running costs are very low, mainly printing and postage. All surplus income goes into funding research.

Donating through JustGiving is simple, fast and totally secure. Your details are safe with JustGiving – they’ll never sell them on or send unwanted emails. Once you donate, they’ll send your money directly to the charity. So it’s the most efficient way to donate – saving time and cutting costs for the charity.

Thank you
Andrew Waller