By Thomas Cooper

Copyright birminghammail

Two brave parents are on the verge of achieving an incredible charitable milestone, having lost two of their children at the same young age. Jane and Paul Phillips are poised to complete their 1000th heart screening today. The family, who were once a happy family of five, were struck by tragedy when their eldest son Christopher, aged 29, died suddenly in 2006. READ MORE: Birmingham nightclub shooting live as four injured and man fights for life Get breaking news on BirminghamLive WhatsApp , click the link to join Five years later, they suffered another devastating blow when their youngest son, Stephen, also 29, passed away in his sleep. Now, Christopher’s twin brother, Craig, is the sole surviving sibling in the family, who reside in Weston, near Stafford. Jane, now 66, shared her heartbreaking story with StokeonTrentLive: “Christopher’s loss was so unexpected. He was enjoying young life with his wife in Oslo, Norway. Then he just suddenly collapsed one day. We never saw it coming. “After Christopher passed away, all of us had heart screenings to try and make sure nothing like that would ever happen to us again. The tests are around 80 per cent effective, so they usually pick up any glaring problems pretty easily. Nothing came back, so we thought we were okay.”, reports Stoke on Trent Live . “But a few years later, Stephen passed away suddenly too. One day he just didn’t come into work. He wasn’t replying to any of their messages or calls either. It was very unlike him, so his manager raised the alarm. He was found dead in his bedroom. He’d had a fatal cardiac arrest in his sleep. He was just 29 too. “We still don’t know what caused their heart attacks. Christopher had a slight problem with his left ventricle, but nothing that would have caused this. Stephen appeared to have nothing wrong with him at all.” Mum Jane expressed the pain of losing two of her three sons as ‘horrific’. “Losing Christopher was just unbelievable,” she shared. “As a mother, you never expect to get that phone call to say that your son has passed away. Especially when, as far as you’re aware, they’re perfectly healthy. “Once was bad enough. And then we had to relive all the horror again when Stephen passed away too. It was truly devastating. I still can’t believe we lost two of our children from the same issue. “I’m just grateful that Craig is still here; he gives us a reason to carry on. It makes you remember that you have someone else to live for. And that you can’t just give up.” Jane and Paul, the parents, became associated with the Cardiac Risk in the Young (CRY) charity back in 2016. They have since conducted hundreds of heart screenings, in an effort to spare other families from their ‘never-ending heartache’. “We do around 100 screenings at the Weston Village Hall every year. This year, we’ve had a lot of requests from Weston Road High School – because a day after I sent details around about the upcoming screenings, a child there had a cardiac arrest at the school sports day. He’s doing okay now, thankfully. “We also do work to look after our older community members too. Once a year, we do health checks for people aged over 35. We do heart screenings, blood pressure checks and check blood sugar levels. “Since our screenings began, around 82 people have been given a medical referral. We don’t get lots of feedback on individual cases, because of confidentiality, but I know there have been cases where it has saved lives.” Despite the Phillips family being on track to complete their 1,000th screening, the determined pair are resolved to carry on their screening work for as long as feasible. Jane continued: “When we first started, it cost around £3,500 a day to fundraise. Now it costs around £7,000 a day. Raising that each year is difficult. But as long as we can do it, we’ll keep pushing. We’re going to keep going for as long as we can.”