An Alloa woman is making an emotional plea for support to help keep the MS Therapy Centre in Stirling running in her mum’s memory.

Due to a gap in funds, the charity is facing the threat of closure and Lorna Raida (37) is appealing for people to lend a hand, to save the centre set-up by her mum and dad.

She said, “Without those funds we’re lucky if we’ve got six to eight months running left and basically we don’t want to see the doors closed. We opened the centre for my mum initially and it would be such a waste.” It was personal experience which led to the MS Therapy Centre being opened nearly 30 years ago, originally in Bridge of Allan.

Lorna’s mum Nancy Malcolm, who passed away in 2011, suffered from multiple sclerosis (MS) and used to travel to Dundee to access the hyperbaric oxygen therapy.

Feeling it was too much of a journey for sufferers, and counterproductive to her treatment, she and husband Derek decided to set one up closer to home.

Despite a long existence the centre – which houses the largest oxygen chamber in Scotland – is now in dire straits due to financial pressures and people are needed to help with fundraising, give funding ideas or simply get involved with running the place.

Lorna, who is chairperson and a director on the committee, alongside working full-time as an office manager for Hymal Tools, is stressing that the situation is critical.

“We need people to fundraise, we need a secretary for the committee, we need someone to come in and do the paperwork for us.

“Predominantly we need people to fundraise for us, we need to raise awareness, we need people out there shaking collection cans, fun runs, coffee mornings. We need funds to keep this going.

“I need bodies, I need people that are willing to help, even put a fundraising team together so I can get a sub-committee so we have actually got a team in place,” she said.

“My mum would hate to see it shut. And it’s for the amount of people I have seen, growing up from being a little girl, that it’s helped and that are still actually here and fighting this nasty, horrible disease.

“I still want to be a part of that and help them fight it, so that they can live and have a better quality of life, rather than it not being here and them getting nothing.

“I’ve seen them deteriorate and know how nasty it can be and the fact that some of them are still here, and they’re still fighting. We’ve been here to help them, we just want to carry that on really.” To donate visit https://mydonate.bt.com/fundraisers/mscentrestirling and to find out more head to http://www.msntc.org.uk/ What is the MS Therapy Centre?

-The Stirling centre is based in Barrowmeadows Road, Springkerse Industrial Estate.

-It aims to encourage people to help each other through mutual support.

-Promotes a better quality of life for people with MS and their families.

-It offers hyperbaric oxygen therapy, which aims to minimise the amount of damage being caused, promote rapid healing and limit the scar formation.

-It offers physiotherapy and acupuncture.