Tashi the wonder dog saved me from life of fainting hell

AN incredible dog has given a midwife a new lease of life after a fainting condition left her confined to a single “safe” room.

- BY MATTHEW BARBOUR

Tashi has been trained to 'alert' Sophie to warn her of an impending fainting episode so she can lie down safely; right, Sophie's condition left her with a string of injuries

Highly trained Labrador Tashi now alerts Sophie Jackson when she detects her heart rate rising, giving her five minutes' warning before a fainting episode.

Those crucial minutes, rather than the mere seconds' warning she once had, allow Sophie to find a safe place and lie down.

At her worst, Sophie was collapsing up to 14 times a day, her face perpetually black and blue from head injuries, her body a canvas of carpet burns and broken bones.

"I looked like I'd been in a car accident," says Sophie, 34, from Birmingham.

Her bedroom had become a prison, with every surface covered in bubble wrap, door handles removed and radiators padded.

"My life felt over. There was no light at the end of the tunnel. I wasn't living - I was just existing." But when Tashi came into her life it granted her vital relief from

Postural Tachycardia syndrome, a condition where the body struggles to regulate blood pressure and heart rate when upright, causing sufferers to faint.

She applied to the charity Medical Detection Dogs and was invited to Milton Keynes, Bucks, to meet some of its highly trained dogs. In a wheelchair, unable to stand, she met several dogs before Tashi came out.