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Good morning everybody, it's a privilege to be here this morning. I, like many of us in
this room, hopefully everybody in this room is absolutely totally passionate about what
I do and there are only eight of us in our office. If we did not have our volunteers,
we would not be able to do what we do. I’m from the Prince Charles Hospital Foundation.
We are all about finding cures and saving lives. We are a health and medical charity,
so we are wanting to be able to raise awareness and unashamedly, we love bankers, we are interested
in dollars, so please, do chat to us. We are unashamedly interested in inspiring people
to be able to support what we do. We are a aligned with the Prince Charles Hospital
itself. We see ourselves as being much more than a hospital, much more than a charity.
We are really passionate about our cause. The Prince Charles Hospital, you may or may
not know, is Australia’s largest Cardiothoracic Hospital, and for many people we are surprised
to realise that on the north-side of Brisbane in our own backyard we have such an important
medical facility. And this hospital is leading the way in very important medical research,
especially cardiac research. We want to be able to help people with cardiovascular
disease and chronic diseases. I've listed there some of the other areas of specialty
championed by this hospital. The Foundation is a not-for-profit, we are
a charity. I would love to be able to point to the fact which is absolutely crystal true,
we do not receive any government funding. And again obviously my times chatting to Tracy
need to progress. Our patron really is the Prince Charles and we are over 25 years old.
So we didn’t just come yesterday, we are around and we are planning to stay. We are
passionate about the people who help us be able to generate income for medical research.
A big thank you to Westpac, I'll say a little more in a few minutes, but Westpac has developed
a fantastic relationship with us in terms of being able to help us be able to go forward,
especially as, we have talked about offering volunteers for diverse events and engagement.
So I don’t know if you do realise that cardiac disease is our biggest challenge as Australians,
it is our biggest killer. And we are leading the way in research in terms of heart valve
procedures. Currently, still leading the way internationally developing an artificial heart,
a fully implantable device that would be able to assist IB implanted into your rib cage
in addition to your current heart or being able to replace your heart. It genuinely exists.
It looks like something that you would stick underneath your sink at home, you know like
the gadget that fits under there - that you get your husband to go in and get the grunge
out if it get stuck. It looks like about that kind of size. It has two very important titanium
plates. It is going to be the means by which we can address the world-wide chronic need
for transplants. I hate to tell you this guys and I know I’m
last up so maybe and we're all looking forward to refreshments, but each and every one of
us in this room is getting older, and each and every one of us, especially as we live
in Queensland - only Japan really bets us for longevity. So Australia is the place to
live if you want to live a long time, and we all want to live a long time, but just
like in the Greek Mythology we want to live a long time and be airbrushed into being able
to completely enjoy that quality of life. And you know what quite seriously we are going
to need to add to medical and health solutions for all of us, and for us women especially
very regrettably to be heading into seventy, which I assure you I’m not yet, but heading
into seventy and having somebody tell you that's the new fifties! Wow, Fantastic! I
hope my heart is going to keep up. So we are all going to be absolutely bought into what
kind of solutions there can be. We are wanting to be able to say that we can
bring these solutions to market much more quickly and so unlike to being now, as it
was a 20 year program to get a man to put a foot on the moon. These years and in only
5 years what can be brought to be able to be offered to real people, to real patients,
is so radically different. The heart valve, which is mentioned there,
is now being able to be undertaken as a procedure which can actually support failing heart valves
by going in through the groin, and that may not seem very interesting to you but in actual
fact, instead of actually undertaking open heart surgeries, in other words, opening up
your ribs cage, you can imagine that patients, we have one particular patient who has had
this procedure twice, who actually compares the differences in recovery from being hit
by a Mack truck to being hit by one of those kids scooters, and that's how he explains
it. And his return to work, his ability to get on with his life and he himself was both
working and volunteering. We couldn’t do what we want to do which
is find dollars to support very essential medical research so there'll be different
solutions for all of us. We are really thrilled and I’m delighted to be celebrating today
and being able to say THANK YOU to our fantastic volunteers. We have a large number of corporate
volunteers who work with us. We offer a great range and diversity of ways in which you can
get involved. The Ekka, the Brisbane exhibition, is a real
celebration of everything Queensland. One of the great things that has been a tradition
for many years, you will recall, I'm hoping there are people in the room, who always wanting
to queue up and to be able to get your Strawberry Sundae.
So, we have two and half thousand volunteers who help us each year. Make those Strawberry
Sundaes, the Ekka Sundae, and be able to sell them. Westpac is being very much in that space
and in case you think that the only thing you need in order to make a Strawberry Sundae
is somebody to chop a strawberry or two, we actually take an enormous amount of money
and most of it in small change. And so one of the key ways, for example, that we are
very interested in bankers is to come and help us to count that money. Thank you very
much indeed. We are also very privileged to have companies
where they kindly run the event and we then, with our volunteers, say only 50 volunteers,
are over to participate in one of the corporate event that they are already running. We ourselves
have our own foundation event which are as diverse as us the Woolcock is our biannual
medical research dinner, and then I don’t think I was able to pick up John Denton on
our cycle here in our picture here, but we have a cycle that happens every year, and
we invite people to come on board and be able to cycle back from the Sunshine Coast back
into Brisbane. We had 650 people cycling with us and we needed then about 300 volunteers
to help that day come off. We are also very privileged to be able to
have community volunteers, and if there is a phrase that I absolutely hate is "oh, I’m
just a volunteer". I really hate that with a passion. I don't think and I’m hoping
I’m not always going to be working to turn a buck in my life. I’m hoping my husband
is going to start keeping me to the manner I want to become accustomed. So, I absolutely
passionately know right now that I will want to be volunteering when I’m retired. I volunteer
now, I get involved in other things and everyone on our staff list volunteers as well. So is
not like it's just going to be in the future, but I know when I’m older, and I actually
want to be able of give back, I don’t want to just for somebody to look at me and assume
that all I can do is stuff an envelope, thank you very much indeed. I really want us to
be able to embrace what we have already started this journey, which is about saying that volunteers
are arrive with a diverse skills base and the best thing you can do for your organisation
or your mission is to be able to leverage what volunteers bring.
So we also have people, choirs, that come and help us sing at the hospital, there is
community volunteers waiting to get I think their free ice cream there. We have over 300
Charles’ angels who work every day as volunteers at the Hospital, roughly 2 per ward or unit,
who come in and are actually, important patient support people.
We also have our Charles’ angels in the distinctive yellow shirts guiding people around
the Hospital. More than 3,000 people work there as like visiting a university, and you
can imagine how many people who apprehensive about what is happening for them health wise.
And, actually want just somebody to tell them, or even to take them to where they need to
go. I wanted to be able to say that our volunteers
are essential. They are essential to us being able to put on a great events but they are
also essential in terms of being able to capture that sense that, our volunteers come from
all works of life, so we do have Tim Mander there. You might not recognise them at hospitals,
really coming on board with being able to talk to camera about what a difference actually
as a result of some new procedures, which were available, ready for him, as a result
of research funding, how he was alive to tell the tale.
We have special individuals, like we all have special people in our life. We have special
individuals and this is Nerida, we also have Diamond Di, people who help with things where
they see themselves as much more modest. And yet, I really wanted to talk about Diamond
Di who comes into our office twice a week to ring people who have contributed less than
$500 to the cause, and thank them. It's the only piece of telephone work that we do and
we want people to know that if you give 10 cents we care, and we want to ring you up
and say thank you, and it’s all done by a volunteer. She wishes to do it, she sends
cards to people, and she has become the thank you lady. And in a way, how fantastic, she
herself wants to contribute, and her contribution is thanking other people for their contribution.
It’s fantastic! We recommended her for an award which she did win.
And then finally I wanted to say what is all of this about in terms of where we are wanting
to inspire people, even our very researchers. 90% of them are volunteers themselves, so
people in this state, it isn’t that you get on to a sort of funded motor highway of
support for the medical research. There are actually researchers are researching with
money that has been donated or secured from trusts and foundations. And what we are wanting
to do, one of the things we have being passionate about is investing in the next generation
of researchers and we started a new program three years ago through which we will be able
to distribute more than $650.000. We are passionate about being able to support the equipment
needs for research. And, we have research grants for more established researchers, of
up to $100,000. We've managed with the help of people who volunteer with us, who help
make a difference, who help get the message out, and who help drive the dollar income
to distribute more than 10 million dollars in research funding in the last 10 years.
And it really is my privilege to be able to talk to you about it today. And, I feel like
we could all potentially be superheroes. I would like to inspire you to maybe take a
little leaflet, read a little bit more about us at the end. But these are not models, well
now they think they're models, we are all waiting for them to get their big break at
Hollywood now, because when they do, we obviously want to donate heavily. But these are all
real people at the Hospital who have been willing to be out there and funky to help
us go the market with our campaign. Thank you very much indeed everybody.