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| Tim O'Connor is Hoping an Experimental Procedure in China will Restore his Health |
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| Eye Diseases and Disorders | |
| Mardi, 02 Octobre 2007 08:00 | |
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There are no translations available. Source: TCPALM It was a beautiful Sunday afternoon, and Tim O'Connor decided to go for an afternoon motorcycle ride down the Treasure Coast. Little did he know the journey he began that day would take him to China in search of a medical miracle. It's not a trip he or his wife Lisa ever wanted to make. But in an effort to make the trip easier, people from Martin County to Fort Pierce are joining hands this weekend. O'Connor's heartbreaking journey began on June 19, 2005, at 1:25 p.m. O'Connor, driving south on U.S. 1 from his Fort Pierce home, saw the driver of a northbound Cadillac Seville turn suddenly into his path. With no time to avoid a collision, O'Connor tried to lay the bike on its side but not before he hit the right front side of the Cadillac's grille. He was critically injured and flown to a trauma unit at a Melbourne hospital. His internal organs swelled to the point doctors had to cut him open from his sternum to his pubic bone to relieve pressure. The surgery left him with extensive nerve damage. He was blind. Doctors said they had no idea how much he could recover. The driver of the Cadillac, Josue Javamillo, 22 at the time, fled the scene but was caught several weeks later in North Carolina. "He was unlicensed and of course he had no insurance," Lisa O'Connor said Fast forward two years. O'Connor, 48, is still blind. Doctors were hopeful there would be some recovery of his sight, but it hasn't happened. He can barely move his hands and arms and relies on his wife, Lisa, to bathe and feed him and help him dress. With aggressive physical therapy there was hope O'Connor would go back to his job as a supervisor with Asplundh's construction division, but it seems he's no closer to doing that than he was in the months following the accident. Several months ago Lisa, 47, read about a Lake Worth man who suffered similar injuries in a boating accident and who made seemingly miraculous progress after going to China for experimental stem-cell therapy. So they're going also on Nov. 4. "We're going to the Shenyang hospital, it's a military hospital about 200 miles north of Shanghai. It's an experimental therapy where they mix human growth hormone with stem cells and inject it into the site of the injury," O'Connor said. "He'll have two spinal impact injections, two injections to the nerve mass in the chest that was damaged in the surgery and a total of four intravenous injections," she said. During the four weeks at the hospital, O'Connor will receive continuous physical therapy to help rebuild the damaged nerves. The travel and hospitalization and therapy and injections are costing $50,000. They've re-mortgaged their home to pay for it. Several organizations have joined forces to try to raise money for the couple. This Sunday there will be a three-county motorcycle poker run and rally that will end in Fort Pierce. There's also a golf tournament at Eagle Marsh Golf Club in Jensen Beach. Lisa O'Connor said the stem-cell therapy is a risk they have to take. "Tim told me he can't live the rest of his life like this," she said. Hopefully, he won't have to.
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| Mise à jour le Mardi, 30 Décembre 2008 18:44 |