“Severe disability turns life upside down” as Paul and his family discovered very quickly. The day-to-day management and medical care of Louisa at home was 24/7, all carried out by family members with no medical background. There were constant medical tests and numerous emergency hospital visits and surgery. Louisa and Harry’s generic condition is called microcephaly which simply means their heads were unusually small. 30 years on and there is still no diagnosis as to what caused this. No root cause diagnosis obviously means no prognosis so the first year of Louisa’s life meant an ongoing huge effort to see if she could reach any milestones at all. But she couldn’t. 

Two years later, Harry was born with the same condition. Eventually both children were looked after in a wonderful residential care home where they were surrounded by love, compassion and a team of fabulous nurses and carers, led by the owner, Hilary Burton, a nurse herself. Paul and Hilary co-founded the charity in 1998 shortly after Harry arrived at the home. Whilst the Cawoods had been dreadfully unlucky, they recognised how lucky they had been to get such amazing care for their two youngest. So Elifar was born with a mission to ease the challenges for disabled young people and their families. 

Elifar provides grants for specialist equipment such as electronic wheelchairs, specialised seating and beds, eating aids, trikes and communication devices to help the lives of children (up to and including the age of 18) with severe learning difficulty and associated physical disability. The intense challenge of daily management at home for these children usually means that a grant from Elifar will also enhance life for the rest of their family. 

In almost 28 years, Elifar has funded grants of around £3.7 million, helping over 2,600 children, an average of almost two grants a week since 1998. The costs of running Elifar are kept to an absolute minimum, with the charity run almost entirely by volunteers. In recent years all Elifar’s running costs have been covered by friends and corporate sponsorship - this means that 100% of your donations go directly where they are needed.