Local nurse takes on Cardiac Challenge
Charity bike ride
Fabienne Bosiger, a registered nurse at Mossman Hospital, will be riding her bike from Cairns to Cooktown to raise funds for improved cardiac care services in Far North Queensland.
Ms Bosiger will be cycling 333km over three days, taking her from the Kuranda Range road, winding upwards through the rainforest to the Atherton Tablelands, across savannah lands and on to the shores of the Coral Sea at Cooktown.
Participating in the Cardiac Challenge is important to Ms Bosiger as not only her grandad received life saving heart surgery in 1980, also her dad had a heart valve and bi-pass surgery followed by her mother in 2022 with a triple bi-pass.
On her fundraising profile she says: “To support the many aims, projects and objectives of the FNQ Hospital Foundation, please sponsor me today in my gratitude for this great cause”.
The man behind the challenge
Pete McNally, the man who came up with the idea for the Cardiac Challenge, was born with congenital heart problems and still requires ongoing cardiac care.
But his heart problems didn’t stop him from pursuing his passion and dreams.
Being a cycling enthusiast, he persuaded the FNQ Hospital Foundation in 2007 that a fundraising bike ride would be a great way to raise money to improve cardiac care services in the Far North, as well as encourage more people to get into cycling.
Nowadays hundreds of cyclists from around Australia and overseas are drawn to Far North Queensland every year to saddle up for the Cardiac Challenge.
The fundraising efforts are being supported by many cardiologists and nurses from the Cardiac Care Unit at Cairns Hospital who take part in the event, along with former cardiac patients and others who have lost loved ones to heart disease.