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Annual report of The Friends of Nigeria-RVH Save a Heart Foundation-June 1st 2019-May 31st 2020. Charity Registration No: NIC100026, Company Registration No: NI624534 and HMRC No: NI00292

Friends of Nigeria-RVH Save a Heart Foundation (Save a Heart Nigeria) came into existence following a unanimous decision by the volunteers (16th Oct 2013) who had participated at the previous medical charity mission to Nigeria; setting up and initiating open heart surgery programme at the University of Nigeria Teaching Hospital as well as in other suitable medical institutions. This report covers our activities from 1st June 2019 to 31st May 2020.

Registration and compliance with regulations:

1. A charity bank account remains unchanged with Danske Bank. The account name is Friends of Nigeria-RVH Save a Heart Foundation Fund (Save a heart Fund). It comprises of a current and savings account. Signatories to the account are the 3 Directors of the Friends of Nigeria- RVH Save a heart Foundation as listed in the company registration document.
2. Friends of Nigeria-RVH Save a Heart Foundation was among the first 100 charities registered following the introduction of the on-line registration of all charities within Northern Ireland. We were delighted to have the group picture of our June 2014 charity mission to University of Nigeria teaching Hospital with our host worthy to appear on the Charity Commission for Northern Ireland web site banner.
3. Company Registration: In compliance with regulatory requirement, Friends of Nigeria-RVH Save a Heart Foundation is a registered charity company, limited by guarantee. There are 5 Directors listed in the company records: Mr Oc Nzewi (Executive Director and Chairman) Dr Bharathi Varadarajan (Vice Chairperson), Ms Janet Mills (Secretary) and Mr Eanan Harkin (Treasurer) and Mrs Karen James
4. HMRC registration for Gift aid and Tax purposes. We are registered with HMRC for Tax exemption and top-up GiftAid claims. A total of £10,338.66 was paid to us during this reporting period.

5. Official web site for The Friend of Nigeria-RVH Save a Heart Foundation remains: www.saveaheartnigeria.org.uk. This is administered by Enthuse.com (formally Charity Checkout.co.Uk)
6.  Account/Independent examiner: Done by Norman Elliott & Company Accountants. No 40 Railway Street Lisburn. BT28 1XP

Donations and Fund-raising activities

Without support and generosity of the wonderful people of Northern Ireland, we would not have functioned and achieved the success we recorded within the past years. Save a Heart is immensely grateful for donations of both new and decommissioned but well serviced and usable equipment and cardiac surgery consumables.

We are particularly grateful to the Choir and entire congregation of the St John’s Presbyterian Church Newtownbreda and the Tuesday Drop in Ladies Club- Belfast South Methodist Church, Agape Centre and their famous “In Stitches Craft Group and friends” for their monetary donations and gift of talent with knitted new born baby’s wear. The brightly decorated knitted wear continues to put smiles on the faces of babies and mothers alike. Together with generous donation from members of the public, a total of £29,214.71 was generated during this financial year.

Charity activities during the reporting period.

1.  Completely free adult open heart surgery at UNTH Enugu, Nigeria October 20th– 27th 2019. As usual, our army of volunteers gave up their holidays and jetted out to hot and very humid capital of Easthern part of Nigeria-Enugu for another round of charity open-heart surgery mission.This by far was the most ambitious in our 7 years annual trip. All surgery was free of charge to all. We planned meticulously and timely, buying every thing that can possibly be needed, packed carefully and flew with 50 pieces of oversized luggage. Not supprise, therefore, but entirely unexpected when the Nigerian Custom impounded our loads and refused to release them. It took intense loobying and negociation and eventually paying custom duty for charity donated medicals to get it released. I have bben instructed on how to avoid this in future. By the time we got our consumables released to us, we were already rounding up our trip. This did not dampen our enthusiasm; Oc Nzewi(local boy) was able to mobilise fund and buy locally available open-heart surgery consumables. We had to resort to old fashion make shift joining of tubes and making it up as you go along; the stress was unimaginable. This stumbling block meant, we had to be very selective on the cases we did. We had to only operate on those that are at high risk of dying because they were so sick to survive till our next trip. A total of 10 very high risk and complex procedure were successfully carried out out of planned 20; from a total of 65 patients that turned up to seek help from us. We were heart broken not to have done more for these desperate patients. However, we “look forward in hope”. The Board of Trustee remain very gratefully to all the 14 volunteer that travel from UK and the 6 that joined us locally within Nigeria for making this trip a successful one. (See pictures)
2. Outside Cardiac Surgery activity: Visit and donations to New-born special care Unit at UNTH: We were delighted to learn and see the effect the brand-new GE Lullaby

Warmer+Resus Prime we donated last year is making in the management of the pre- mature tiny babies treated at this unit. Rev Dr Iloh, the consultant in charge cannot thant us enough. We are very proud of our involvement with this unit. We donated boxes of knitted new born baby wear from the In-Stitch Craft Groups and Friend of Agape Centre and The Royal maternity Hospital Belfast. They have enough to give away to over 500 babies. There will be no doubt lots of smiles from babies and mums.

Financial report: A total of £29,214.71 was raised in this financial year. Total expenditure was £49,585.63. The very high expenditure reflect the totally free nature of the Oct 2019 trip. The fund raising efforts and yield continue to go down. This appears to be same with most small charities in Northern Ireland. The Covid-19 pandemic will even make this worse. Detailed account is contained in the annual account report.

Action plan for next year:

We are not planning any annual trip in 2020. We will devort our efforts towards raising more fund and look forward to a bigger totally free open-heart surgery in 2021.

Below are snap pictures of the activities by the volunteers over this reporting period.

Checking-in at Belfast City Airport and having a wee coffee while waiting to connect at Heathrow.

Re-stocking UNTH Heart centre with equipment, case selection & surgery-high risk urgent cases including 4 double valves and 3 modified Bentall procedures.

Patients from previous year came to see us(arrowed). Different categories of teaching & training.

Save a Heart Volunteers at Agape Centre with the South & Central Methodist In-Stitch Group and Friends Representatives. Their colourful knitted wears puts smiles to baby & Mums at UNTH New Born Special care Unit. ( picutres sent by the Assistant Director of Nursing Matron Irene.

Vise en espoir “look forward in hope” To do nothing is no longer an option.