Fashion innovator, design guru and retail legend George Davies is donating over five million pounds to the University of Leicester and the University Hospitals of Leicester NHS Trust for research into vascular disease and limb amputation.
George Davies is arguably the most influential fashion retailer on the British high street having brought us Next in the 1980s, George at Asda in the 1990s and Per Una for Marks & Spencer in 2001. These highly successful brands have become part of the fabric of British retail life.
Davies’ biggest passion is supporting good causes and focusing his energy on improving the lives of others. Davies immerses himself in the detail, he endeavors to work and meet with beneficiaries so he can understand their needs and support them in the best way possible. For him there is no greater feeling than giving something back.
The funds that Davies is donating will be put into vascular research at the University of Leicester and Leicester’s Hospitals and will also establish a Vascular Limb Salvage Clinic (VaLS) at Glenfield General Hospital, which will open on the 26th September 2017. The Assessment Unit will allow a limb salvage team to identify and treat patients with poor leg circulation quickly and prevent amputation. In addition, research will be supported to identify the underlying causes of limb loss. Many of these patients will have type 2 diabetes which is an increasing problem, which the public is aware of, but the public is not necessarily aware of the link to vascular disease and limb loss, especially in younger people.
Worldwide, every 30 seconds a limb is amputated due to vascular disease, with a major amputation taking place every 2 hours in the UK. With thousands of people in the UK affected by vascular disease and poor circulation, Davies wanted to bring awareness to a cause that could be prevented with efficient research.
“Working with charities close to my heart is extremely important to me. In particular, vascular care and diabetes type 2 needs further funding to create wider awareness. We need to educate all ages about the severity of the symptoms if left untreated. Communication is a key factor in the project and with my business expertise and the talent of the medical professionals I will be working with, we hope to improve and bring together the healthcare service.“
The Vascular Limb Salvage Clinic (VaLS) will launch on Tuesday 26th September 2017 at Glenfield Hospital, Leicester. The unit will provide patients with circulatory problems in the legs a place to be assessed and start a treatment plan without the delays often associated with conventional NHS treatment. This one stop approach will allow all investigations to be performed and a treatment plan to be initiated within a few hours rather than it taking several days for different teams to make an assessment. This will therefore save time, remove delays, reduce costs and most importantly save legs.
“We are tremendously excited by this extremely generous donation. Funding will benefit both the clinical service at the hospital and the universities research programme. This will engender enormous patient benefit – not just to people in Leicester and Leicestershire, but to everyone suffering from vascular disease. “Professor Phillip Baker, Pro-Vice-Chancellor and Head of the College of Medicine, Biological Sciences and Psychology.
George Davies’ generous donation will make a strong impact in aiding research and trying to reduce the overall number of amputations.