Pride of Britain: Mum of sepsis survivor raises thousands for hospital that saved daughter's life

  • Joyce Cripps has been shortlisted for ITV News Anglia's Regional Fundraiser of the Year Award, as Andy Ward reports.

A mother whose daughter's life was saved by a liver transplant has vowed to continue fundraising for the hospital unit where she was treated for "the rest of her days".

In 2018, Joyce Cripps, 76, from Bishop's Stortford in Hertfordshire, was just two weeks away from losing her daughter Julie Halls who suffered multiple organ failure after contracting sepsis.

Ms Halls survived after specialist surgeons carried out emergency liver transplant surgery at Addenbrooke's Hospital in Cambridge and she is now on the road to recovery.

Ever since, Mrs Cripps has been raising money for the hospital's transplant unit as a way of saying thank you, with her efforts seeing her shortlisted for ITV News Anglia's 2024 Regional Fundraiser of the Year Award for the Pride of Britain Awards.

Joyce's daughter Julie suffered multiple organ failure. Credit: Julie Halls

"I will fundraise for this wonderful hospital, for the transplant unit, for the rest of my days, and as long as I'm able to, because what can you say when somebody saves your daughter's life?" Mrs Cripps told ITV News Anglia.

"It really doesn't matter whether they're 47, as she was when she had the operation, or whether they're still 7-years-old - she's still my baby.

"What would I have done without her? Words, nothing, can thank them enough and the only way I can say thank you is to pay back and fundraise."

Mrs Cripps is no stranger to fundraising, having first started her journey 40 years ago when her daughter's school was hit by a devastating fire.

Since then, she's raised more than £100,000 for various causes - including £25,000 for the transplant unit.

The perfusion machine at Addenbrooke's Hospital. Credit: ITV News Anglia

The money raised has enabled the hospital to renovate their pre-operation rooms into a colourful and calm place for patients to relax before surgery, as well as helping to fund the use of a state-of-the-art perfusion machine which allows doctors to preserve organs better than ever before.

"Historically, when we've taken livers for transplantation we've had to keep them on ice - a little bit like you would using a fridge," said Andrew Butler, who was the surgeon in charge of Ms Halls' life-saving operation.

"The problem with that is, obviously much in the same way that things in the fridge deteriorate over time, the same is true of a liver. So, this machine was developed essentially to try to prevent that deterioration in the organ."

When asked what it would mean for her to win the Regional Fundraiser of the Year Award, Mrs Cripps said: "I just don't know what it would mean.

"Everybody says: 'What you do, how do you do it?'. I just do it because I love it."

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