SUDEP
Action
Michelle Samuel, who lost her sister to
epilepsy, attended a 10 Downing Street
reception hosted by Samantha Cameron
for SUDEP Action. The night launched
the charity’s appeal for research into a
sleep monitoring device that could help
prevent Sudden Unexpected Death in
Epilepsy (SUDEP).
Michelle attended the event with her
husband Andrew Samuel. Her sister,
Diane Croft, was only 20 when she
died in February 2004. Michelle, from
Heathfield, East Sussex, has been
working with SUDEP Action to raise
awareness and support research into
SUDEP. Epilepsy claims at least 1,150
lives a year in the UK and about 500 of
these are SUDEP.
At the reception, Mrs Cameron met
with all charity supporters and staff.
The event brought together SUDEP
experts, policymakers and families
bereaved by epilepsy.
is proved to detect apnoeas. Professor
John Duncan of University College
London created it through a partnership
between researchers at the National
Hospital in London and Electrical
Engineers at Imperial College.
Michelle said: “When Diane died, I
could not imagine how life could carry
on without her. Life is never the same
after you lose a loved one. I still grieve
but I am also proud to be involved with
SUDEP Action and to help prevent
unnecessary epilepsy deaths.”
Jane Hanna OBE, Chief Executive of
SUDEP Action, said: “We are very grateful
to Mrs Cameron for generously hosting
us and helping us raise awareness of this
issue. Apnoea is a leading contender as a
cause of SUDEP. At the moment there is
no reliable method to detect apnoea in the
home with the consequences that there
are hundreds of preventable deaths every
year in the UK. ”
As part of its work in supporting
research, the charity is also currently
promoting the first register of epilepsy
deaths in the UK, aimed at supporting
research into epilepsy deaths. The
register is providing researchers with
vital clues that will help them understand
and ultimately prevent SUDEP.
The charity began as a campaign by
five women, Jane Hanna OBE, Sheila
Pring, Catherine Brookes, Sue Kelk and
Jennifer Preston.
Jane’s partner and Sheila’s son Alan
died in 1990, aged 27; Catherine’s
son Matthew died in 1991, aged 21;
Jennifer’s son William died in 1988, aged
22 and Sue’s daughter Natalie died in
1992, also aged 22. They were all young
and active people who died suddenly
and unexpectedly.
By Juliet Tumeo
www.sudep.org
Funds raised from the appeal will
sponsor research into the sleep device
that will be used to alert carers to
dangerous apnoeas that can cause
sudden death.
The device is a miniature Wireless
Apnoea Detection Device (WADD) that
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She added: “We need at least £165,000
to test this device on people with epilepsy
as the next step towards a system that
may be highly reliable for preventing
SUDEP. We are grateful for supporters
like Michelle and Andrew who continue to
raise funds for the charity and make such
projects possible.”
Round and round the
Mulberry House
Our recent merger with long
established firm Stuckey Carr & Co
has meant that we have two additional
offices and have welcomed new staff
members to the Mayo Wynne Baxter
fold. We can now put Storrington and
Pulborough pins on the map.
Our Storrington staff are lucky enough
to work from an office steeped in history
as it forms part of Mulberry House at The
Square, in the heart of the village.
An article that appeared in Home
Magazine and the Ladies Field
published in May 1929 featured an
article written by Gwendolyn Oerton.
In it she describes the house inside
and out in great detail:
“This Georgian house in an oldfashioned Sussex village is the country
home of W. Harkess Esq., A.R.I.B.A.
The fact that it is six miles from a station
does not matter in these motoring
days; it ensures on the contrary, a
certain amount of pleasant isolation.
Storrington is on a road which carries
a good deal of summer traffic, but its
old-world atmosphere has not suffered
much thereby.
The history of Mulberry House is by no
means clear; the oldest inhabitant says
“doctor lived there a time back and built
on a bit.”
Gentry have apparently always had it.
The house has a partly walled garden of
no great size but judging from the trees
growing there, it must be getting on into
its second century.
Originally a double-fronted house, two
windows wide on either side of its delightful
door, an addition has been casually made
to the eastern end; the space between
the windows was not measured with
any degree of accuracy - otherwise the
extension is hardly noticeable.
There is the correct low mansard roof but it
is tiled instead of covered with the expected
slates. At either end there is a chimney
stack and high up over the second floor is
a solitary fan-shaped window.
The sashed windows are large for the
size of the house and come to within a
short distance of the floors; the front door
is practically flush with the garden level.
As is so often seen in Georgian houses,
the portico has columns framing it and a
graceful fanlight to admit daylight into the
hall. Our ancestors believed in security
and all the windows are provided with
wooden shutters. The original plan of the
north of the garden elevation has been
obscured by the building on the various
times of extra domestic accommodation
and bathrooms but for all that it presents
a homely and comfortable aspect.
The walls on this side are of mixed stone,
faced with brick. Fine specimens of yew,
cedar of Lebanon, chestnut trees and
various cryptomeria are planted about the
lawn; the rest of the garden is quite informal
and old-fashioned – there are grass walks,
flower borders, a pond, various old garden
ornaments of stone and last but not least,
a real 18th-century stone grotto! One
of our pictures shows it in the distance,
approached by a grass walk, on either side
of which is a flowering border where such
things as a phlox, love-in-a-mist, catmint,
marigolds, and horn poppies gloom gaily.
In the foreground is a pair of stone
vases exactly like Georgian wine urns
on a gigantic scale. The approach to the
grotto is guarded by two large unclipped
yews. As to the grotto itself, the Sussex
flints of which it is built are nearly hidden
by a mantle of ivy, but we can see one
or two of the pillars, and catch a glimpse
of a stone vase on the top. In the old
prints of such places as Cremorne
and Vauxhall Gardens similar grottoes
were depicted: ‘twas there the Georgian
dandies dallied with the ladies who had
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