Hyperbaric Oxygen Treatment for Geena

Help Geena on her incredible journey to rehabilitate from Cerebral Palsy. Tragically, Geena was born without a heartbeat via emergency caesarian section in August 2000. She suffered oxygen asphyxia due to a placental abruption and was revived after the ninth minute of resuscitation. Her parents were told at the time that she would only live a few days at most. Remarkably, she did survive, but with a diagnosis of Cerebral Palsy at 16 months old, life has not been easy and the road to a better quality of life is a very rocky one.

Cerebral Palsy takes many forms. Geena’s is defined as quadraplegic, mixed-tone athetoid and ataxic. This affects all that she does - walking, talking, eating, drinking and learning. All of her gross and fine motor skills are affected. Geena made steady but slow progress with physio-therapy , speech language therapy and occupational therapy from the early intervention team at the Wilson Centre up until 2005.

Geena’s primary school years have been difficult as her learning has been hampered by her physical condition and constant tiredness. Geena would be home from school one if not two days a week just to rest or with illness. Unfortunately, when she was 8 years’ old, she developed epilepsy which made learning even more difficult. It took about five years of trying different epilepsy medications to get control of her seizures.

In 2010, Geena had autologous stem cell treatment at a private clinic in Dusseldorf Germany followed by physiotherapy sessions in New Zealand. She showed improvements in her walking and coordination; she had more energy for life.

In 2011, Geena had a retainer made for her mouth by the Oral health specialist at Middlemore Hospitial that helped her learn to swallow more effectively and she no longer drools at all.

More recently, in January 2014, she had Hyperbaric Oxygen Therapy (HBOT) at Mapua Health Centre, near Nelson, New Zealand, under the supervision of Dr Tim Ewer. This is the only clinic in New Zealand that offers this treatment to those with cerebral palsy. She had 26 one-hour long treatments of HBOT over three weeks. We took the opportunity for Geena to have a SPECT brain scan before and after the HBOT treatment. With great results showing from the before and after brain scan images, there is clinical evidence that this has worked to improve Geena's brain function. Even better, Geena's fine motor skills have improved to the point that she can now do up her buttons , tie her own shoe laces, put a key in the lock and turn the key to open the door, cut up her own food – all things she couldn’t do previously, unaided.

Knowing how much the hyperbaric oxygen treatment has helped, Geena would like to have more sessions at the Mapua Health Centre. We desperately want this too. However, the cost of sessions and accommodation is expensive. One session of HBOT costs $275 and she needs at least another 26 sessions. Financially, family and friends have helped privately so far, but we are running out of steam just when things are starting to show real improvements for Geena. We need your help to keep up the good work and help Geena to have the most independent life as possible. Please donate and join Geena on her journey to a better life.