Fawcett made history when she became the first Canadian soldier amputee to return to a war zone since the Korean war and she hopes to make history again when she stands on top of Mount Kilimanjaro and launches her new charity ParAthletes of Canada (PAC).

“Kids living with missing or amputated limbs should participate in sports from the sports field just like everyone else and not from the sidelines,” Fawcett said.

The Coast’s Abilee Kellett is no stranger to climbing and she will be summiting Mount Kilimanjaro next week along with amputee Kimberly Fawcett in order to launch a new children’s charity from the mountain top.

Her new charity will help children with amputations compete and actively participate in sport.

Fawcett said she’s heard from many child amputees about improperly fitting limbs and inadequate equipment that is impeding mobility.

“I am tired of hearing about the complaints which are widespread across Canada, so I decided to do something about it,” she said.

To help bring attention to her new charity, Fawcett set up the climb, which will include eight other women, some fellow amputees and soldiers, who are set to leave Feb. 1.

Kellett first heard about Fawcett through her mom Sarah Doherty, who is the inventor of SideStix sports crutches.

The two women were acquaintances, but had never met.

So when Fawcett came to Kellett’s university to talk about being an athlete with a disability, Kellett took the opportunity to meet her face to face.

“I went to meet her because I was interested and my mom knew her but hadn’t met her yet, so it was a good way to make the connection,” Kellett said.

Kellett and Fawcett went for lunch and soon formed a bond.

“She’s great. Kim is really amazing. Her story and everything that she’s been through and what she’s done for so many other people — it’s a pretty awesome thing, so it’s hard not to bond with her,” Kellett said.

When she heard about Fawcett’s upcoming climb and the reason for it she was enthusiastic and wanted to be a part of it.

Fawcett was planning to use SideStix for part of her journey and needed someone knowledgeable about the crutches to come along.

“I’ve learned all about them, how to take them apart and how to fix things that can go wrong, so basically I’m going to go with some spare parts on this trip and a few of [the climbers] will be using SideStix. I’m just there sort of like their technician,” Kellett said.

“But mostly I just wanted to sign up for the adventure. It sounded like a really cool thing, and Kim’s organization PAC is also really cool, so it just all worked out that I could be a part of it.”

Kellett leaves Vancouver on an early morning flight to Ottawa on Jan. 31 where she will meet up with the rest of the crew bound for Mount Kilimanjaro in Tanzania.

Christine Wood

© Copyright 2012, Coast Reporter
Story URL: http://www.coastreporter.net/article/20120130/SECHELT0101/301309999/special-summit-has-coast-connection

These short videos provide a brief overview of what you can expect when you receive your SideStix and attachments. They also guide you through the process of setting up your SideStix as quickly as possible.

If you still have questions, our product knowledge team would be happy to help you. Just visit our Contact page!

Discovery

Boundless

Crutch Attachments Overview

SideStix has always been about removing boundaries. Nico Calabria uses both the SideStix Boundless Pro forearm crutch and the SideStix Discovery Pro forearm crutch – depending upon his activities.

In this video Nico pushes his SideStix to the limits, performing unimaginable parkour stunts as well as showcasing his soccer skills. Watch Nico sprint, jump and leap his way over a variety of obstacles and make precision shots on net!

Nico is one of the original SideStix testers and an amazing kid, so take a moment to share. Remember to thumbs-up his video if you enjoyed watching (located on the bottom left of the YouTube video).

We look forward to more videos from Nico and hope this inspires others to send in their own SideStix clips, regardless of ability!

The Sidestix team gathered with more than 100 people at the Buccaneer Restaurant in Sechelt, BC for a celebration on the air-date. The event included local press, UBC researchers involved with SideStix, and of course friends and family.

The SideStix Team left to right: Leah Goard, Geordie Harrower, Kerith Perruer-Lloyd, Sarah Doherty, Tammy Williams, James Higgins, and Veronica Alice.

Many were anxious to learn the results Sarah and Kerith had been hiding since the summer, although those with any knowledge of the quality and design of SideStix already knew the results in their hearts. Nonetheless everyone was still thrilled to officially learn that SideStix sparked the Dragons’ investment interest; reaching a deal with Bruce Croxon for $60 000 dollars for a 30% share of the company.

Kerith and Sarah with UBC researchers Bonnie Sawatzky Phd & Megan MacGillivary

The period of heightened interest and activity following a Dragons’ Den appearance has been aptly named “The Dragon Effect”. This is only to be expected with national television exposure. Any business that makes the show sees the effect regardless of the reaction from the Dragons.

Since the show’s air date we have been feeling great about the direction that SideStix is going. Our website saw an 800% increase in traffic and our blog, Facebook page and Twitter have all been extremely active since the show. Comments, Likes and Retweets have been numerous.

We have also been approached by distributors and manufacturers and will be starting some dialogues with them soon. We are happy to report we are still engaged in discussion with our Dragon, Bruce Croxon.

CBC Television has filmed a follow up segment with Sarah, Kerith and Bruce Croxon. Stay tuned as we are anticipating its release early in the new year.

A big thanks to Lynda Chyzyk for taking and providing the beautiful pictures of the night.

This council acts as the first point of contact for small and medium-sized enterprises, entrepreneurs, students, business persons and researchers seeking information related to the regional science and technology sectors.

The MISTIC Innovation Awards were developed in 2006 to showcase and acknowledge the accomplishments of technology based businesses on Vancouver Island, the Sunshine Coast and Gulf Islands.

The winners of these awards were based on a set of marks focusing on value, marketing, community impact, and sustainability.

SideStix Ventures Inc. was named the winner of the councils “Emerging Product” category which recognized small business’ in the technology sector which show the potential to grow and become a permanent fixture in the local economy.

Chris Foreman of Foreman CNC (A partner in SideStix manufacturing) graciously accepted the award on our behalf.

We wish to thank Chris for representing us; as well as everyone on the MISTIC Council for recognizing SideStix with this award. We promise to continue our trend of quality innovation in our field.

We are unable to comment on the results of our participation on the show, but it is easy to recognize how national televised exposure couldn’t be anything but positive. We are able to say that we are very proud of our performance on the Dragons’ Den and hope this is evident to everyone tuning in.

We would like to thank our many supporters for the momentum and motivation to get us this far. Dragons’ Den will simply be one more step in our journey towards providing the world with a healthy alternative to traditional forearm crutches.

If the recent recognition by the Michigan MS Society with the da Vinci Award for Mobility and Transport is any gauge we may well be on our way!

For those outside Canada or without cable we will be posting the video and links regarding our segment on Facebook, Twitter and our blog so if you are unable to catch the air date keep checking in for updates.

Mariana at Ilha Bela, Brazil
The very best example and undeniable proof of effectiveness came from Mariana,  a woman with Cerebral Palsy, who was from a group home and came to the beach for therapy. She came alive with  a new freedom of movement which gave her stability and confidence.

Dr. Rains and Brazilian psychologist Eliane Ramos (who was part of our team) were present at the demonstration of SideStix on the Ilha Bela beach and noted the transformation of Mariana upon using the crutches.

Dr. Scott Rains said “You would have genuinely been moved by this particular encounter with Mariana. This woman fell in love with the stability and light weight of the SideStix crutches.”

Eliane  Lemos (Brazilian psychologist specializing in disability who has traveled with the Brazilian Paralympics team) said “Unbelievable what I saw happen with this woman. Her posture improved, she gained speed in her walking and her joy came to life.”

With the help of you, our loyal fans, we were able to bring in enough YouTube video votes to beat out seventeen competitors. This included entries from both GMC and MIT. The winner of the Leo (People’s Choice) Award is based solely on fan votes, making us this year’s winner by a large margin. Below is Sarah and Kerith’s acceptance speech which was shown live at the award ceremonies.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jnN1-I2jTnY

If winning the Da Vinci Leo Award wasn’t exciting enough, SideStix also had the honour of receiving a da Vinci Award in the Transportation and Mobility category. An impartial panel of expert judges representing the technology and disability communities selected the finalists and da Vinci Award winners in each category. Below is the video played at the ceremony of Sarah and Kerith with our video’s film maker, Veronica Alice, accepting the award.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z_hshRtzoXI

We want to thank our fans and user’s most of all for the support which allowed us to take home the Leo Award. We would also like to thank the disability community for recognizing the worth of our innovations. Finally, we would like to again thank the MS Society of Michigan for holding the da Vinci Awards to recognize innovation in areas which truly improve the quality of life for people living with disability.

Keep your eyes and ears open for more news from SideStix Ventures. With your continued support we are moving closer to our goal of providing the best forearm crutches allowing our users to remain comfortable, active and healthy!