Welcome to Heart Failure Unfiltered, a powerful podcast series from the Pumping Marvellous Foundation — the UK’s heart failure charity.

In Episode 2: Life After the Implant, Nick Hartshorne-Evans is joined by Dr Fozia Ahmed, Consultant Cardiologist and patients living with ICD and CRT devices to explore what happens after the procedure.

Because the real story doesn’t start in the theatre.It starts when you go home.

❤️ What Is Life Really Like After a Heart Device?

This episode goes beyond the clinical explanation and into the real, lived experience of life with a cardiac device.

💬 From the moment you leave hospital…
💬 To the fears, questions, and realities that follow…
💬 To finding your way back to “normal” — whatever that means.

🧠 What You’ll Learn

🎙️ Real Patient Voices

This is not theory.

You’ll hear honest, unfiltered experiences from people living with cardiac devices — sharing what surprised them, what challenged them, and what helped them move forward.

Because living with heart failure isn’t just physical.
It’s emotional, social, and deeply personal.

⚡ Why This Episode Matters

Too often, the focus is on the procedure — not the person.

But life after a cardiac device raises real questions:

This episode gives clarity, reassurance, and truth — from both clinical and patient perspectives.

🧠 Who This Episode Is For

📣 About the Pumping Marvellous Foundation

We exist to make heart failure understandable, manageable, and less frightening.

By amplifying patient voice and working alongside the NHS, we aim to improve outcomes and everyday life for people living with heart failure.

Visit https://pumpingmarvellous.org or https://beathf.org.uk for further information.

🔔 Follow the Series

This is Episode 2 of a 3-part series on cardiac devices.

👉 Episode 1: What are ICD, CRT-P & CRT-D?
👉 Episode 3:Talking about cardiac devices and their role in the management of heart failure?

Subscribe to stay informed, supported, and connected.

💬 Join the Conversation

Living with a cardiac device?
Waiting for one?

Share your experience or questions in the comments — your voice matters.

Welcome to Heart Failure Unfiltered, a powerful new 3-part podcast series from the Pumping Marvellous Foundation — the UK’s heart failure charity.

In this episode, Nick Hartshorne-Evans, Founder & CEO of the Pumping Marvellous Foundation, is joined by Dr Fozia Ahmed,Consultant Cardiologist, and patients living with cardiac devices to open up an honest, human conversation about heart failure treatment.

This episode focuses on one big question:

What are ICDs, CRT-Ps and CRT-Ds — and why do some people with heart failure need them?

What You’ll Learn

What’s actually happening in the heart during heart failure

When medication alone may not be enough

What ICD, CRT-P and CRT-D devices do — explained simply

The difference between these life-saving devices

How devices help reduce risk and improve quality of life

What it really feels like to be told you might need one

Real Patient Voices

This isn’t just clinical theory.

You’ll hear directly from people living with cardiac devices— their fears, their questions, and what they wish they’d known earlier.

Because heart failure isn’t just a diagnosis.

It’s a life lived day-to-day.

Why This Matters

Heart failure affects over a million people in the UK — yet many are diagnosed late.

Cardiac devices like ICDs and CRTs can:

Prevent sudden cardiac death

Improve heart function

Transform quality of life

But too often, patients don’t fully understand theiroptions.

This podcast changes that.

Who This Episode Is For

People living with heart failure

Anyone told they may need a cardiac device

Families and carers

Healthcare professionals wanting a patient-firstperspective

NHS leaders focused on improving cardiovascularoutcomes

About the Pumping Marvellous Foundation

Visit https://pumpingmarvellous.org or https://beathf.org.uk for further information.

We exist to make heart failure understandable, manageable,and less frightening.

Through education, community, and patient voice, we workalongside the NHS to improve outcomes and experience for people living with heart failure.

Subscribe to stay informed, empowered, and connected.

Join the Conversation

Have you been told you might need a device?

Living with an ICD or CRT?

Share your experience in the comments — your story helps others.

What does “better” heart failure care actually look like in2030?

And more importantly…

👉 Do we have a shared vision to get there?

In this episode of Heart Failure Unfiltered, Nick Hartshorne-Evans the CEO of the Pumping Marvellous Foundation explores the future of heart failure care — from the perspective of patients, clinicians, and the NHS.

💡 What this episode explores:

Whether the NHS has a clear, shared vision for heart failurecare

What is currently missing from the future conversation

How life with heart failure should feel different by 2030

What should become routine — not exceptional — in caredelivery

The role of simplicity in designing the future system

🔍 The key questions:

Are we moving fast enough to improve outcomes?

What happens if nothing changes?

What should be simpler by 2030 — and what’s the risk if it isn’t?

Who needs to be braver to make change happen?

🎯 What success looks like:

Not just better metrics on paper — but real-world change that patients can feel:

Earlier recognition

Faster, more confident treatment

Better coordination across the system

Improved quality of life

⚡ The challenge:

If we don’t define the future of heart failure care… Who will?

🔎 Who this is for:

NHS commissioners and ICS leaders

Cardiologists, GPs, and specialist teams

Policymakers and healthcare leaders

People living with heart failure and their families

❤️ About the Pumping Marvellous Foundation

Working with patients, communities, and the NHS to shape the future of heart failure care across the UK.

When it comes to heart failure, time matters.

But where do we lose it?

In this episode of Heart Failure Unfiltered, Nick Hartshorne-Evans CEO of the Pumping Marvellous Foundation, explores one of the most critical gaps in NHS cardiovascular care:

👉 The delay between first symptoms, diagnosis, and treatment.

💡 What this episode covers:

Why heart failure diagnosis is often delayed

The early signs patients notice before the system does

Where care gets stuck between diagnosis and action

What makes clinicians hesitate — and what helps them movefaster

Why knowing what to do isn’t the same as doing it

⚡ Introducing BEAT to TREAT

A model designed to shorten the time between concern andcare.

This episode explores:

What problem BEAT to TREAT is solving

How it accelerates decision-making and treatment initiation

Why traditional pathways can slow things down

Where speed makes the biggest difference for patients

🔍 The critical questions:

Where do we wait when we shouldn’t?

Where could we move faster?

And what would patients feel first if we got this right?

🎯 The reality:

If time is one of the biggest determinants of outcome inheart failure…

Why do we still accept delay as part of the pathway?

🔎 Who this is for:

GPs, nurses, and Primary Care teams

Cardiologists and specialist services

NHS commissioners and ICS leaders

Anyone involved in improving cardiovascular pathways

❤️ About the Pumping Marvellous Foundation

Working with patients and the NHS to improve heart failure diagnosis, treatment, and outcomes across the UK.

What are BEAT Heart Health Events really showing us?

In this episode of Heart Failure Unfiltered, Nick Hartshorne-Evans CEO of the Pumping Marvellous Foundation explores a critical question for the NHS and prevention:

👉 Are we seeing more cardiovascular risk — or simply seeing it sooner?

Across communities, patterns are emerging:

Repeating risk factors

People discovering risks they didn’t know they had

Shifts in age, background, and health profiles

Earlier signals that were previously missed

But spotting risk is only the first step.

💡 What this episode explores:

What BEAT Heart Health Events are revealing about population health

Whether we are interpreting real trends — or projectingassumptions

How communities are responding to earlier identification of risk

What should happen after someone attends a heart health event

How to turn insight into action without overwhelming people

🔍 The bigger question:

If BEAT events are a mirror…

What is the community showing us right now — and are we ready to respond?

⚡ The BEAT Lens:

Simple. Recognisable. Actionable.

Making risk visible without making it frightening — and turning awareness into meaningful change.

🎯 Who this is for:

Public health leaders and NHS commissioners

Primary Care and community healthcare teams

Cardiovascular clinicians and prevention specialists

People interested in heart health and early risk detection

❤️ About the Pumping Marvellous Foundation

Working with patients, communities, and the NHS to improveheart failure prevention, outcomes, and quality of life.

Is Primary Care under-involved in heart failure — or under-enabled?

In this episode of Heart Failure Unfiltered, Nick Hartshorne-Evans CEO of the Pumping Marvellous Foundation, explores one of the biggest opportunities in NHS cardiovascular care:

👉 Unlocking the power of Primary Care in heart failure management.

We ask the real questions:

What makes heart failure difficult to manage outside secondary care?

Is the barrier knowledge, time, confidence — or system design?

What signals from patients are being missed?

What does it actually mean for Primary Care to “champion” heart failure?

And most importantly:

What would make GPs feel confident — not cautious — aboutmanaging heart failure?

💡 What this episode covers:

The role of Primary Care as the front door of the NHS

Where Primary Care has the biggest impact in the heart failure pathway

Why current system design can hold clinicians back

The practical enablers that could change behaviour at scale

How small changes could unlock major improvements in patient outcomes

🎯 The core challenge:

If heart failure is a long-term condition…

Why is Primary Care still treated as peripheral?

🔎 Who this is for:

GPs, Practice Nurses, and Primary Care teams

NHS commissioners, ICS leaders, and policymakers

Cardiologists and specialist teams

People living with heart failure and their families

❤️ About the Pumping Marvellous Foundation

Working alongside patients and the NHS to improve heartfailure outcomes, experience, and quality of life across the UK.

Heart failure care is full of good intentions — guidelines, pathways, scoring systems, and risk tools.

But what happens when they all collide?

In this episode of Heart Failure Unfiltered, Nick Hartshorne-Evans asks a fundamental question:

👉 Have we over-engineered heart failure care?

Introducing BEAT Heart Failure — a simpler, clearer way tosupport patients, empower clinicians, and create something the NHS can actually deploy at scale.

This episode explores:

Why complexity in heart failure care can overwhelm patientsand clinicians

What BEAT Heart Failure really means in practice

Whether a patient can explain it, a nurse can use it, and the NHS can deliver it

Why most good ideas fail — and how BEAT avoids that trap

The power of simplicity in improving outcomes and savinglives

💬 The take-home message:

Simple is safer — because clarity travels further than cleverness.

🔎 Who this is for:

People living with heart failure and their families

Nurses, GPs, and healthcare professionals

NHS leaders, commissioners, and policymakers

Anyone interested in improving long-term condition care

❤️ About the Pumping Marvellous Foundation

We are the UK’s heart failure charity, working with patients, the NHS, and partners to improve outcomes, experience, and quality of life.

Heart Failure in Primary Care: Why Training Is Essential for NHS Outcomes, Admissions & Early Diagnosis

Heart failure training in Primary Care isn’t optional—it’s essential to improving NHS outcomes.

In this Heart Failure Unfiltered Masterclass episode from the Pumping Marvellous Foundation, Nick Hartshorne-Evans explores a critical system-level question:

👉 Is investment in Primary Care heart failure education one of the most underused levers for improving cardiovascular outcomes across the NHS?

With over 1 million people living with heart failure in the UK—and mortality exceeding many cancers—early recognition still depends heavily on Primary Care knowledge, confidence, and consistency.

🔍 In this episode:

Why heart failure training in Primary Care is essential—not optional

The role of education in delivering the NHS Long Term Plan cardiovascular priorities

How variable knowledge leads to delayed diagnosis and unwarranted variation

Why training should be treated as system infrastructure, not just CPD

⚡ Early diagnosis & treatment

Improving access to NT-pro BNP testing

Timely referral for echocardiography

Rapid initiation of disease-modifying therapy

Reducing delays in optimisation of the four pillars of HFrEF treatment

🏥 Reducing admissions & system pressure

How earlier diagnosis reduces avoidable hospital admissions

The impact of clinician confidence on admission thresholds

Supporting safe community-based management

Aligning with winter pressures and Same Day Emergency Care priorities

⚖️ Tackling inequality & variation

How delayed diagnosis disproportionately affects deprived communities

The role of education in reducing health inequalities

Aligning with Core20PLUS5 and population health strategies

Reducing unwarranted variation across ICS footprints

🚀 Workforce & system transformation

Standardising heart failure education across Primary Care

Supporting PCNs through multidisciplinary learning

The role of digital decision support tools

Embedding refresher training for sustained impact

🔮 Looking to 2030

What happens if every Primary Care clinician is confident in heart failure?

Could heart failure mirror the success of early cancer diagnosis programmes?

Should education be a core cardiovascular transformation metric?

💡 Primary Care education in heart failure isn’t just a training issue—it’s a system redesign opportunity.