A group of South Edinburgh fundraisers has donated over £1000 to an organisation that provides help to sufferers of a little-known liver disease.

May Whitson, sister Lillian Davis and fellow members of Gilmerton Miners Welfare staged an evening of entertainment recently and were pleasantly surprised when the proceeds amounted to £1020.

As a sufferer of Primary Biliary Cirrhosis, Lillian was keen to give the money to the PBC Foundation, itself founded by a fellow sufferer from South Edinburgh.

Collette Thain MBE, of Hallhead Road, Newington, founded the organisation in 1996, having been told by doctors in 1994 that she had five years to live.

"It's brilliant to come back to my roots to receive this cheque from such a hard-working group of people," she said. "There is so much in the press about liver disease, so it's good to get the word out about primary biliary cirrhosis"

PBC is a liver disease that is unrelated to alcohol or drug abuse and that affects mostly women. There is no known cure and PBC is the principal reason for liver transplantation.

Lillian was diagnosed with PBC in October 2006 and says that she, like many others, had been unaware of the condition.

"When I was diagnosed with it, I'd never heard of the condition. I just had to give up work. It makes you feel very tired – you don't know from day to day how you're going to feel. As soon as you hear primary biliary cirrhosis, people think alcohol – but it's not about that at all.

"I'd never heard of it, so I went on the internet and started reading about the PBC Foundation."

May and friends from the Gilmerton club assisted in organising an entertainment evening at the end of March.

She said, "We sold tickets, held raffles, there were two bands [Aquarius and Phoenix] there who played for free – they were brilliant. For one night, it took a lot of organising, but the money we raised is really good for one night."

Around 140 people from Edinburgh and beyond attended the event, helping to raise the impressive four-figure sum.

The money will go towards reaching every PBC patient in the UK, educating people about the condition, improving sufferers' lives and, hopefully, finding a cause and a cure for the disease.

• Pictured above (left to right) is May Whitson, Ruby Conway, Lillian Davis, Collette Thain and Emma Brooks. Fellow organiser Kevin Conway was unable to attend the photoshoot.



• For more info, go to www.pbcfoundation.org.uk