Encouraging Emersyn

Emersyn Jane Hardie was born on 16/7/21 unfortunately during birth she suffered a significant brain injury known as Hypoxic Ischaemic Encephalopathy (HIE)

Emersyn’s delivery was traumatic and when she was born she had no heart rate and wasn’t breathing.

During her time in NICU for a month on breathing support, Emersyn had a number of tests and investigations and an MRI confirmed her brain was damaged from the lack of oxygen in the basal ganglia area.

Although there is no cure for HIE, latest research highlights the condition greatly benefits from intense early intervention & physical therapy. Many studies discuss neuroplasticity and identify that a baby’s brain is able to “rewire” its self and with the right tools it can re train to work around these damaged areas that aren’t “supposed” to work .

Unfortunately New Zealand doesn’t have the same types of services that are available in other countries to support this neuroplasticity journey.

So Emersyns family are currently in Australia for a 3 week intensive therapy at The Centre of Movement in Burleigh.

This type of intervention is not cheap - As they are NZ citizens and there is no funding available to cover this type of intensive intervention. For Emersyn to gain the full benefits of this type of therapy it is most likely she will be needing to go multiple times a year and also purchase specialised equipment. This will put pressure on this young family as Mackenzie has been unable to return to work.