Our ambassadors
Interwoven into understanding the need to support patients’ emotional health and wellbeing are the Amiri brothers, Hussein, Hamed and Hessam. Hamed, in his recently published book “The Boy with Two Hearts”, refers to the three of them as the “Three Musketeers”. This book tells the story of the family’s desperate flight from danger, travelling across so many countries and encountering so many challenges in order to seek asylum in the UK. Asylum was needed for the whole family to build their lives afresh, but importantly to help Hussein with much needed cardiothoracic treatment. Fundamentally, Hamed’s book is a story of inspiration and love.
Hamed Amiri & Hessam Amiri
Hessam Amiri is a Public Governor of the University Hospitals Bristol and Weston NHS Foundation Trust (UHBW). Currently Hessam works as a Digital Marketer helping charities and organisations in the use of new technology. By becoming an Ambassador of Daring to Dream, Hessam hopes to help promote the improvement of hospital experience and visits for patients and their families. Many NHS staff have, he feels, become part of his own extended family over the years through their support and care of his brother. Hessam is hoping to build further on what he has learnt through his own and his family’s experiences, and work to promote and encourage the ongoing development of trusted patient and clinical staff relationships, which are a critical element to NHS care of patients at their most vulnerable.
Hamed Amiri is the author of “The Boy With Two Hearts: A Story of Hope”. Hamed’s book is a dedication to the NHS and what individual staff members mean to him as they looked after his brother for so many years, and also supported all his family. He hopes through his story, that people will understand love has no bounds and that the wellbeing of patients, and also of their family, can literally be the key to survival at times. He is currently working as Head of Development in a large South Wales firm of solicitors. As a Board Member of Coleg Gwent, and also a motivational speaker, he seeks to influence change in the perceptions surrounding refugees and diversity within the education sector.
“Ever since we can remember the Visitor Rooms in hospitals have always been a place of sadness complemented with boring colours; as kids we used to imagine the floor being lava to create a distraction for our minds whilst being in the hospital. As adults we did countless laps in the hospital corridors to escape the same room. hospital, is a place filled with love & care.”