Bike ride raises health funding

LOSING an 18-month-old daughter to a rare heart condition is something that no family should go through.

Mark Gwynne’s story on P4 today melts your heart as he recalls 13 years ago the sudden death of Sophie.

One day she was a completely normal 18-month-old toddler.

She had a cold. The next day she died of two heart conditions no one could have foreseen.

Doctors later assessed Sophie was struck down by a double whammy of cardiac conditions – interstitial myocarditis and hystiocytoid cardiomyopathy – a rare disease.

Even if she had been put on an ECG it would not have mattered.

Now Mr Gwynne is determined her death, which he has not talked about much, will not be in vain.

Later this month he will ride 330km to Cooktown in Sophie’s honour, his first time riding the Mt Franklin Cardiac Challenge.

“Nothing could change what happened, but the more that we can do to help other people, the better off we all are as a community,” he said.

Mr Gwynne wants to make sure that people of the Far North do not have to travel south to Townsville or Brisbane for heart treatments.

The Cardiac Challenge, hosted by the Far North Queensland Hospital Foundation, has raised $3.1 million for cardiac services, including contributing to the second cardiac catheter laboratory at Cairns Hospital.

It’s incredible that the Far Northern community has to raise money for medical services, whether it be for cardiac, cancer or other illnesses.

But the people of the region do, and they dig deep and are very generous. Nick Dalton Deputy editor