Kidney fund gets Punchestown first race

The first race of this year's Punchestown festival has been gifted to the Punchestown Kidney Research Fund established by Kilcullen's James Nolan, writes Brian Byrne.

The tradition has been that the final race of the Festival was the PKRF charity sweepstakes, where amateur riders raised sponsorship money for the fund. Some €1,570,000 has been raised down the decades.

With Punchestown again this year being held in pandemic restrictions, it is impossible to continue the tradition, but James Nolan says the gifting of the first race, to be named Have The Conversation Say Yes to Organ Donation Novice Handicap Hurdle, will help raise much needed awareness until the charity race can hopefully resume in its traditional format.

Among many other things, the Fund has supported many initiatives including the landmark project — the state of the art renal unit in Temple Street Children’s Hospital, contributed to the refurbishment of the dialysis unit at Sligo General Hospital, provides support to continuous research programmes and sponsored trips to ski camps for younger kidney patients.

"There were an incredible 123 kidney transplants carried out during a very difficult and challenging 2020," says James, himself the recipient of a donor kidney from his sister Catherine decades ago. "However, there are over 600 people on the list for a lifesaving kidney transplants so we would ask people to have the conversation at home about organ donation."

Anyone can free text the word DONOR to 50050 and either click on the link to receive an Organ Donor Card by post or download a digital organ donor card. 

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