A prestigious golf club has pitched in to help improve the quality of life of a young boy in the Highlands who needs round-the-clock care.
Four-year-old Kieran McKelvie-Walker, who attends the nursery at Brora Primary School in Sutherland, suffers from autism, epilepsy, asthma and Wolff-Parkinson-White syndrome, a condition that can cause the heart to beat abnormally fast. He requires full-time care and support and regularly has to attend hospital.
Kieran's father Drew is a chef at the world renowned Royal Dornoch Golf Club and when officials at the club heard of Drew's fundraising efforts to buy equipment to keep Kieran safe and relaxed they decided to help.
The club has donated £1,000 from its Captain's Charity Fund to help create a 'safe space' for the youngster, similar to one at Raigmore Hospital in Inverness which he found beneficial.
The safe space includes a padded area where Kieran can play with soft balls, a UV light source and a soft glow blanket to help relaxation.
Drew said: "Because of his autism, Kieran also has trouble sleeping and needs three sleeping tablets a night. His blanket helps to calm him down before he goes to bed.
"The UV light adds to the sensory room experience of his bedroom. We have noticed his mood has changed and he has become calmer while spending time there."
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereComments are closed on this article