At 58, Karen Kerr faced a prognosis of never walking again due to her brain condition.
A mother who was told she would never walk again because of a brain injury has described how her son’s physiotherapy clinic restored her independence.
In January 2023, Karen Kerr, 58, phoned her son Iain Legge to say she was struggling to use her hands, could not stand up, and her speech was slow and slurred. He feared she had had a stroke, but it soon emerged she had suffered brain damage as a result of a genetic condition.
Mr Legge, 30, lives in East Ayrshire and is director of Cortex Physiotherapy, which he founded in 2024 alongside his partner, physiotherapist Dionne Harvey, 33. When she became unwell, Ms Kerr had been living in Dorset for around 10 years.
Mr Legge recalled: “I immediately thought she’s having a stroke, so we got an ambulance down to her house and she was taken to hospital. They investigated what had happened, and it was found pretty early on that there was brain damage, and they later found that my mum had been living with a condition called haemochromatosis.”
Haemochromatosis is a genetic disorder that stops the body from processing iron properly. When iron levels build up, it can cause stroke-like symptoms as seen in Ms Kerr. It also damages the liver, pancreas, joints and heart.
The condition can be fatal if left untreated, and Ms Kerr deteriorated to the point where she was unable to stand or sit upright. She lost a considerable amount of weight, weighing just over six stone at her worst, and spent four months in hospital.
She also needed four care visits from at least two carers at a time every day and never left her room. The room she lived in was what medical professionals call a “micro-environment”, where everything she needs is kept, including her bed and toilet.
Ms Harvey said: “She had a lot of built-up iron in her system. Other toxins which were then not getting filtered by the liver were building up in the bloodstream. Those toxins in the blood were then reaching the brain, and that is what was causing the damage.”
Mr Legge said: “The hospital was going down the route of trying to get my mum into a 24-hour care facility, because she deteriorated so far that she couldn’t hold a sitting balance. Obviously, we didn’t want that.
“We pushed to try and see if there was an alternative to get her back home and after four months, she was discharged and she had barely any sitting balance. Everything she had was in one room – the bed, the commode – she couldn’t leave
Hi, I’m Benjamin, a member of the Sherburne County Citizen team. With a passion for writing and a deep interest in current affairs, I thoroughly enjoy bringing you the latest news and trends that affect our daily lives.
