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UL Hospitals Pieta House 5k Fundraiser a Huge Success

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Pictured at the UL Hospitals Pieta House 5k Fundraiser – Marian Long, Pieta House, Colette Cowan, CEO UL Hospitals Group, Stormdi Cameron, event participant and Richard Lynch, I Love Limerick. Picture by Cian Reinhardt/ilovelimerick.

UL Hospitals Pieta House 5km 2016 was a huge success bringing crowds to the University Hospital Limerick on Friday, August 19.

The event formed part of the group’s Healthy Ireland agenda, recognising UL Hospital’s crucial role in promoting the health and wellness of the staff it employs and the population it serves. That commitment to health and wellbeing was recently formalised through the publication of the group’s Healthy Ireland Implementation Plan 2016-2019.


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The Run/Walk was about promoting exercise and physical fitness but also mental health and wellbeing. And those who support the event would also be helping those at risk of suicide and self-harm in the Mid-West with all proceeds going to Pieta House.

“It means so much to all of us from Pieta House. All of the funds that are raised help keep our doors open and in turn allows us to help people in need of support.” Said Marian Long, from Pieta House. “We are so grateful for all the support that the public give us and we hope to continue the good work.”

Over 200 staff and members of the public participated in the UL Hospitals Pieta House 5km run /walk in 2015, raising almost €2,500 in the process for assessment and therapy services run in Limerick by Pieta House.

“Last year, it was so successful. We want to continue this annually and make the event better than the year before,” said Colette Cowan, CEO UL Hospitals Group, “We want to show that we care for vulnerable and mentally ill people as much as the physical-treatment patients we see day in and day out.”

Friday, August 19 was the day of the Walking Finals in Rio and UL Hospitals Group encouraged people, if running was not their thing, to walk the route– even if not at an Olympic pace.

 Members of staff from UL Hospital Group, Nenagh and Croom Hospitals were already getting into the Olympic spirit and had been training for a number of weeks ahead of the event.

“With their help, we hope to surpass the numbers who participated last year and in the process raise funds for a very deserving cause,” said Laura Tobin, Project Lead for Health and Wellbeing, UL Hospitals Group, a physiotherapist by profession.

Runners and walkers paid an entry of €10, got a t-shirt and an official time on crossing the finish line and a medal. There were prizes for the first three male and female participants to finish as well as for the first walker home.

The UL Hospitals 5k Run/Walk was followed by a barbeque in Russell’s, Fr. Russell Road.

Click here to find out more about the Healthy Ireland agenda.

You can find out more about UHL here.

Here you can read past stories about UHL.

 

Richard is a presenter, producer, songwriter and actor. He was named the Limerick Person of the Year (2011) and won an online award at the Metro Éireann Media and Multicultural Awards (2011) for promoting multi-culturalism online. Richard says that the ilovelimerick.com concept is very much a community driven project that aims to document life in Limerick. So, that in 20 years time people can look back and remember the events that were making the headlines.