Deep vein thrombosis (DVT) Update

Back in March I posted about my friend Katie McPherson that died of DVT and her family’s petition calling for the Scottish Executive to introduce mandatory assessment tools for all health boards for the diagnosis of deep vein thrombosis and to get all newborn babies tested for the “Factor V” gene that increases their susceptibility to the condition.

I would like to share this email from my good friend Steven McPherson…

Subject: Update on epetition for my sister

Hi all,

Just a wee update on the above. Hope you will remember earlier this year you and many others very kindly signed the epetition for changes to the management and protocols for DVT as a result of the death of Katie.

My parents were at the Scottish Parliament today (which they say is a truly horrendous building) to meet with the epetitions panel to discuss this petition further which I am pleased to say went very well.

They were met there by newspapers and a TV crew, before and after they went into the parliament and the news clip can be found here http://www.stv.tv/content/news/health/display.html?id=opencms:/news/health/Call_for_DVT_screening_20071002 . If you wish to see the full 35mins of their presentation within the parliament drop me a line and I can forward this onto you. I am told it will appear on www.holyrood.tv/ tomorrow under the archive section, although I have a copy of it if this is not the case. Both my parents did very well within the parliament making their points very clear and answering all the panels questions in great detail.

I am aware from my good friend Martin there were also stories on the radio and teletext (of all places) today, covering this. My parents were interviewed by a number of press after the session, so no doubt this will appear in further papers/TV/radio etc tomorrow and over the remaining week.

It appears that at long last we are beginning to make some head way. I believe the next stage is for the epetitions panel to look into the existing guidelines / protocols to establish the current situation and then look into how things can be changed for the future.

I’m sure you don’t need reminding but Katie would have been 28yrs old this Sunday.

Main point of this email is to once again thank you for your support. In the end we managed to get 143 signatures for the epetition which is fantastic and would not have been possible without all your support.

Many thanks and look forward to seeing you soon.

Steven McPherson

The family have a Website “ http://www.dvt-awareness.co.uk/ ”  where they link to many news stories on the subject and a couple of videos. Although it is too late to sign the petition, please lend your support any way you can…

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