We could have died without top team of hospital heroes

Claire Murphy

SCIENCE teacher Ayeisha Grogan had part of her skull removed when her brain swelled severely after a tragic car accident.

Ayeisha, from Kilkenny, doesn't remember the incident, which happened on a wet, stormy night when her car left the road and crashed, leaving her in a coma for six weeks in intensive care.

Her brain swelled to beyond the size of her skull and doctors had no choice but to remove some of the bone to save her life. Ayeisha pulled through, but she still struggles with mobility every day.

paralysed

Thanks to staff at the National Rehabilitation Hospital, she is now on the road to recovery.

Ayeisha's story is just one of many featured in a new RTE documentary taking viewers behind the walls of the Dun Laoghaire treatment centre.

Cameras follow the daily struggle of those injured in car accidents, the side-effects of cancer and freak accidents. One of Kerry's rising hurling stars, Tim Curran O'Brien, was involved in a car accident the day after his deb's dance last year.

Tim (19) is now paralysed from the neck down but non-surgical intervention at the NRH means that he is learning how to get around again. Joe Murray was just five when he was run over by an oil tanker.

The lower half of his body was crushed and, despite efforts to keep his leg, it was finally amputated when he was 21.

Joe hates wheelchairs and has been using crutches -- but now his upper body is in danger of seizing up and he is in the NRH to get a prosthetic limb fitted. On the RTE documentary, Joe begins his journey to take his first step in seven years.

Young Gavin O'Halloran, from Cork, has leukaemia and suffered a serious stroke which left him with speech, behaviour and mobility problems.

A team of medical consultants, therapist and technicians specialise in giving Gavin a good quality of life. Since the NRH opened doors in 1961, it has treated over 40,000 patients.

The Road To Rehab airs on Tuesday, September 6, at 10.20pm