My husband and I recently took our son Alex to see Dr Tom and his team. Alex had a stroke in december 2011 which left him with right sided hemiplegia.
He has been having regular physio and OT, he walks with a limp but is pretty stable, we are having problems with his hand. He can use his arm quite well but he has no fine motor function in his handand is prone to clawing.
OT have told us that this is as good as his hand will get, my husband and i are not going to accept that.
I already had Dr Tom’s Sucecssful Stroke Survivour book and followed ARNI on facebook. I received an email inviting us to a massed training session so i contacted ARNI to book a place for Alex.
After speaking to Dr Tom we arranged to meet and we were lucky to get a one to one session, it was the best thing we have done.
After our first session Alex and ourselves left feeling so positive. We had a fantastic day, we were all shown exercise’s and a ” magic trick” as Alex like’s to call it to relax and work with his hand. We hadn’t seen Alex use his hand that much since his stroke but he was happy to use his hand with Dr Tom, and he used it alot that day and has done since.
We have just had our second session which was free, with five other Instructors there too and we are already seeing improvement in Alex’s hand movement, he is more positive and willing to use it. He has also just ridden his bike for the first time post stroke.
My advice to any stroke survivour and family is go to one of the session’s it will change your life.
We are so grateful to Dr Tom and his wonderful team and we look foward to our journey through Alex’s rehabilitation with them.
