A Caithness woman has completed a gruelling 130-mile run from Thurso to Inverness in a bid to shine the spotlight on the downgrading of health services in the region.
Lorna Stanger left Thurso’s Dunbar Hospital at midnight into Wednesday bound for Raigmore Hospital, via Wick’s Caithness General.
Ms Stanger took on the challenge to raise awareness of issues many in the county face when trying to access healthcare.
She said: “I am somebody from the area who is waiting to speak with services in Inverness.
“I feel like I am being kept hanging on.
“There are a lot of people up in Caithness in the same boat.”
Ice cream the reward for hard miles
The 52-year-old anticipated the challenge would take her approximately 30 hours.
Ms Stanger made good time on Wednesday, arriving at Caithness General around 4.30am.
She was even able to stop at a friend’s place in Brora for ice cream after the halfway mark.
However, with the unpredictable change in weather, she was forced to take a four hour break in Alness on Thursday morning before making roads for Inverness.
A bout of sickness also hindered progress, but she arrived in the Highland capital around 4.30pm today.
Her time of departure was also calculated to portray the uncertainty surrounding when healthcare services may be required.
The challenge came after health secretary Humza Yousaf and public health minister Maree Todd rejected a request to try out the journey pregnant Caithness mums are forced to make for themselves.
Ms Stanger said: “I am a twin myself and I have two sets of twins.
“My boys were born 10 weeks premature and my girls six weeks. If I had been living here when they were born– they wouldn’t have made it.
“I had to get an ambulance to Glasgow as I was living in Aberdeen but had I been in Caithness, it would have been a different story.”
Only sheep are now ‘born and bred in Caithness’
She continued: “It is not a case of Inverness has the services we don’t have. There are a lot of services that used to be available here that are no longer.
“We still need these services. People are still here, they haven’t gone away.
“I saw a sign in a shop that said ‘Caithness born and bred’.
“There is nothing much really being born and bred here in Caithness any more than sheep.”
No stranger to a challenge
The massage therapist is no stranger to a challenge having covered the distance previously.
She has also scaled Ben Nevis three times in one day, and cycled the NC500 – after running to Inverness first.
This time round, she sought to raise awareness of the work of the Caithness Health Action Team (Chat) and to raise funds for Macmillan Cancer Support.
She added: “I wanted to raise funds for Macmillan too as there are a lot of cancer patients from Caithness who have to travel to Inverness.
“A woman commented that she had been feeling car sick all the way to Inverness, to then feel sick through treatment.
“If I run for 24 to 30 hours, there are a lot of people feeling worse.”
Speaking at the finish line, Ms Stanger said: “It was tougher than I thought it was going to be.
“I slowed down a lot and I felt sick along the way.
“But that is sometimes what people have to deal with on that trip.
“I think this has done Chat’s cause good and it is also good for Macmillan.
“Hopefully it has been a good way of spending the last 48 hours.”
The journey others won’t undertake
Ron Gunn, vice-chairman of Chat, praised Ms Stanger’s efforts.
He said: “This is a fantastic thing Lorna has done.
“Not only is she raising funds for Macmillan and Chat, she is, in an absolutely unique way, highlighting the problems so many patients in the north have to face.”
He added: “Lorna is prepared to run the 120 miles to highlight the length of the journey yet our elected MSP Maree Todd, along with the Humza Yousaf, refused Jamie Stone’s offer to take them from Wick to Inverness in the comfort of his car to let them experience the journey that is so common for many patients in the north.”
Fundraising pages have been set up individually for Macmillan and Chat.