Bradford College

'Treasure your Heart'

Bradford College are backing Heart Research UK’s (HRUK), ‘Treasure your Heart’ campaign. The College has been working in collaboration with Yorkshire’s own national heart charity, in a bid to give hearts a health boost.

The ‘Treasure your Heart’ campaign kicked off at Bradford College on Monday 18th October, with a series of activities planned throughout the week. Staff and students were treated to Healthy Heart checks.   Principal and Chief Executive of Bradford College Michelle Sutton, OBE backed the initiative, saying: “We’re really pleased to welcome our colleagues from Heart Research UK.” 

“It’s really important that the College as part of its Healthy College activities ensures students and staff are aware of the issues that could affect their health.  We’re delighted that Heart Research UK selected Bradford College to launch the campaign and share their message of adopting a heart healthy lifestyle.”

Bradford College are the proud sponsors of the HRUK Healthy Heart Leaflet designed for the South Asian Community.  To promote the leaflet a launch event was held at the Level 6 College restaurant.

Girlington resident, Mohammed Rafiq Sehgal, had a heart attack last year and visited the College to back the Healthy Heart Week and speak about his own experience of embracing a healthier lifestyle.  Speaking at the event Mohammed said: “I’d encourage everyone to listen to the advice that’s on offer and don’t take your heart health for granted.”

Mohamed continued: “Having a heart attack came as a shock to me as I’d always considered myself to be quite healthy.  I didn’t eat a lot of fatty foods – or take outs.  I was fairly active as well. So I classed myself as reasonably healthy.”

Mohammed experienced chest pains and decided to drive to the Bradford Royal Infirmary.  It was there that he discovered that he had in fact had a heart attack. 

Speaking about how the heart attack has changed Mohammed’s approach to health, he said: “I try to walk as much as possible, I hardly use a car.  My diet has also changed. After the heart issues I felt I needed to make this change.”

It is estimated that 76.8% of the population in NHS Bradford & Airedale do not eat healthily and that 88.6% are physically inactive. This means that life expectancy and early deaths from heart disease and strokes are all worse than the England average. Heart Research UK wants to help change this fact by showing the local people that by getting active and eating healthily you can protect your heart.

Commenting on the statistics, Healthy College Manager, Jane Marshall said: “The health of the Bradford population hasn’t been good for a long time.  The College is a great place to spread the word that we need to look after our health. We’ve got a large population in the College, so we need to play our part in educating people on this subject to get the rates of diabetes, obesity and cardiovascular heart disease down."

Bea Dinsdale, Lifestyle Manager at Heart Research UK concluded: “Our ‘Treasure your Heart’ in Bradford campaign is all about encouraging people to take positive action to help reduce their risk of developing heart disease. The Healthy Heart message is simple and everyone can do something to take a step towards a healthier lifestyle. We will show people just how easy it is to make a few small changes to their lifestyle and encourage them to do it.”

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