Thinking about doing your Christmas shopping online? You might like to use the Easyfundraising site to do this. This is an excellent, easy, on-line way to help raise money for future  research and Birdshot days, while you do your normal on-line Christmas shopping and it doesn’t cost you anything. Retailers such as Amazon, Next, Argos, John Lewis, Comet, iTunes, eBay, M&S  and HMV, all give money when you shop-online via Easy-Fundraising. You shop directly with the retailer as you would normally do, but if you sign up to http://www.easyfundraising.org.uk/bus for free and use the links on the easyfundraising site to take you to the retailer before you shop, then a percentage of whatever you spend comes directly to us at no extra cost to yourself. This service is FREE to use and will give you access to hundreds of exclusive discounts and voucher codes, so not only will you be helping us while you buy your Christmas presents, you will also help to save money yourself.

We are members of EURODIS via the Uveitis information Group. We would like to ask our members to consider signing an appeal in support of the Telethon. Over 1,800 people have already signed and it is of utmost importance to reach 5,000 signatures!

The Telethon is organised by the AFM, the French Muscular Dystrophy Association. Although the Telethon is run in their name it raises over 100 million euros for research and services to aid the lives of people living with Rare Diseases generally.

Certain groups have for some time declared that the French Telethon supports only one disease area, this is not true. The AFM Telethon contributes yearly to the French Rare Disease Alliance, EURORDIS and Orphanet, it supports vital services and funds medical research programmes covering many rare diseases. In fact a number of European researchers work in collaboration with those funded through the Telethon, so any threat to this event will impact on the development of rare disease research right across the continent and beyond.

Thanks to the AFM Telethon:

• 2,700 genes identified
• 34 clinical trials ongoing

With this in mind, we ask you to sign our appeal at
http://telethon.soutien.eurordis.org/en

KEN FITZMAURICE, OUR HERO, RUNNING A MARATHON FOR UVEITIS

We are really excited to tell you that Ken Fitzmaurice, a qualified Pilates instructor, is running in the 2011 marathon to raise funds for Uveitis research. Please dig deep and donate to this cause – it should help us find more targeted and less toxic medication. To donate, just go to:

http://www.justgiving.com/Kenneth-Fitzmaurice

Ken wanted to run for BUS (Birdshot Chorioretinopathy Uveitis Society), but because we are so small (just Annie and Rea) and we have concentrated on working to support people with Birdshot and raising the profile of the disease, rather than raising funds, we do not have the money to pay the very large entrance fee for marathon runners.

So, in a unique and first ever partnership, Fight For Sight has entered Ken into the London Marathon under their membership, on our behalf. Fight For Sight is a large charity that raises money for research, and we have been working with them for some time now. The money raised by Ken will be going towards research being undertaken by Dr John Curnow and Professor Phil Murray. Below is a description of the research project, which we are hoping will lead to less toxic medication for all of us. You may know that Professor Murray is one of the several prominent ophthalmologists that works with us through our Mother charity, UIG (Uveitis Information Group), and has been enormously helpful to BUS too. We are so pleased to be able to raise money for this project, so please dig deep – you never know – this might just be the research that helps us get a better quality of life.

Description of research: Ocular regulatory T cells in Uveitis: Uveitis is the 5th commonest cause of visual loss in the developed world and is characterised by a large increase in the number of white blood cells (T cells) entering the inflamed eye. Some of these cells are aggressive (effector T cells) and cause damage to the eye. However another group of cells are designed to switch off the aggressive cells, and are termed regulatory cells (regulatory T cells). The role of these regulatory cells in uveitis is not well understood.

This project aims to determine if the regulatory cells and aggressive cells use different mechanisms to be recruited to the eye in inflammation. In addition it is possible that the inflamed eye may prevent the regulatory cells from functioning properly. The data generated will further our understanding of how regulatory cells control inflammation in uveitis. In addition it is hoped to identify new therapeutic targets that will either prevent recruitment of pathogenic cells while still allowing regulatory cells to go to the eye, or allow the regulatory cells to switch off aggressive cells more efficiently.

This may ultimately lead to the development and testing of appropriate new biological therapies for the treatment of patients with sight-threatening Uveitis, such as Birdshot Chorioretinopathy.