Here is how you too can help! Thanks Ivan Angulo!

Everyone can make a contribution to help those most affected by Huntington’s disease. In this brief post, we wanted to thank Dr. Iván Angulo for his commitment to rare disorder research. Iván is a former colleague of Nacho who reached out to raise funds for our Venezuelan colleagues suffering from HD. He decided to raise money for Factor-H via Facebook, while he run his first half-marathon.

If you think you would want to follow Iván and help raise money for Factor-H, please get in touch! Below you will hear directly from Iván about his race, his motivation, and his commitment to fighting rare diseases through science and advocacy!

As many others I started running to keep myself physically and mentally fit during the pandemic. After my first race, the Cambridge traditional Towns and Gowns 10K, I decided to challenge myself with a half marathon and add an extra level of meaning to the race by fundraising for a charity very close to my heart. On March 6th, 2022 I completed the Cambridge Half Marathon!

I am a scientist and during my career I have been driven to rare diseases drug development. It started at Charles River labs where I contributed to the progression of various CHDI programs and it continues through my current work at HealX where I have expanded to other therapy areas.

It was while working on CHDI projects that I met Nacho and learned about Factor-H. Their work in providing support to HD patients of the areas of South America with higher prevalence of the disease touched me to the core (this is probably a good time to mention that I am Venezuelan). Hence, the decision of which charity to support was crystal clear, it had to be FactorH. 

Today, about two weeks since the race I am happy to say that from the running perspective it went great. I finished with a time of 1hr 54min, a whole 6 min faster than my goal time! But I am even happier to say that, with the support of a fabulous number of generous donors, the original £500 fundraising target was overly exceeded and that Factor-H has received £1110 to help them in their mission.

A heartfelt thank you to the friends, family and network who will be making a difference in HD patients and families lives with their donations.