5th birthday celebrations for Harry’s Hydro

Harry’s Hydro, the hydrotherapy pool in Frome, is celebrating its fifth birthday.

The pool, run by a local charity, is a community facility for those with disabilities, sensory, learning or behavioural difficulties and life-threatening illnesses (e.g. cancer) or limiting conditions such as rheumatism. It caters for all ages from babies to the elderly. The pool is used seven days a week from early morning with some sessions finishing at 8pm.

“For many of the users who have more challenges in life than most, their time in the pool is the highlight of their week,” said Peter Bennett, a trustee for Harry’s Hydro. “Smiles are the main language used.”

The pool was built in memory of local boy Harry Fox who died aged 13 months. His parents, Digby and Paula, set the charity up but the fund raising, build and management have been supported by a faithful group of trustees who hosted a party to celebrate the success of the facility after five years of operation. The backbone is the team of volunteer water testers who all tucked into some wonderful food and birthday cake.

The half a million pound hydrotherapy pool is available to those in the community who need it. Hydrotherapy is physiotherapy undertaken in an environment of warm water and high air temperature, the combination of which relaxes the patient and eases pain, which frees the user to move in ways they cannot on land. The pool and environment at these warm temperatures is also very effective for those with learning difficulties as it satisfies and calms their sensory needs, thus allowing them to use the more complex thinking and communication parts of the brain.

If you or anyone in your family would benefit, see the charity website: www.harrys- hydro.org and contact Helen Woodhead on 01373 474127.