Andy
Honorary Member
Back story:
About 6 months ago, I posted here about the unfortunate turn of events surrounding our lighting engineer, Oz (Austin). He suffered a ruptured aorta. Usually fatal, but in Oz's case, they managed to stabalise him (to some extent) at our local hospital. After being transferred by helicopter to QE critical care hospital in Birmingham, he continued to have a rough time (understatement of the year) for several months. He required resuscitation no less than 11 times during the first two weeks, & we thought we'd lost him.
After much interest here & many kind wishes, I promised an update, so here it is:
We visited Oz in the specialist orthopaedic hospital some 100 miles away last week. Here he is (pictured with my wife) having his ward Christmas dinner. His heart (aorta) is still very weak, & will probably take another year to repair to a point. He's permanently paralysed from the chest down, c/w all the attendant lack of functions that accompany such a condition, but he is still with us, & true to form, in amazingly good spirits. He's scheduled for discharge at the end of January, all being well.
On Christmas day, the hospital has provided an ambulance to travel the 100 miles from the hospital to his favourite pub near Hereford. He can only stay for two hours, but all of his friends & the band will be there. We're even planning a little acoustic set for him. So, some Christmas cheer indeed. Nothing quite like the return of a dear friend who you thought was lost to you.
Oz will be back on band lighting duties as soon as he's able. It's one of the things he's really been looking forward to. One way or another, we'll find ways around the logistical challenges to make that happen.
Happy Christmas everyone, & thank you for your kind wishes. I'd like to think it helped Oz in some way. We'll never know eh - but he beat the odds big time!
About 6 months ago, I posted here about the unfortunate turn of events surrounding our lighting engineer, Oz (Austin). He suffered a ruptured aorta. Usually fatal, but in Oz's case, they managed to stabalise him (to some extent) at our local hospital. After being transferred by helicopter to QE critical care hospital in Birmingham, he continued to have a rough time (understatement of the year) for several months. He required resuscitation no less than 11 times during the first two weeks, & we thought we'd lost him.
After much interest here & many kind wishes, I promised an update, so here it is:
We visited Oz in the specialist orthopaedic hospital some 100 miles away last week. Here he is (pictured with my wife) having his ward Christmas dinner. His heart (aorta) is still very weak, & will probably take another year to repair to a point. He's permanently paralysed from the chest down, c/w all the attendant lack of functions that accompany such a condition, but he is still with us, & true to form, in amazingly good spirits. He's scheduled for discharge at the end of January, all being well.
On Christmas day, the hospital has provided an ambulance to travel the 100 miles from the hospital to his favourite pub near Hereford. He can only stay for two hours, but all of his friends & the band will be there. We're even planning a little acoustic set for him. So, some Christmas cheer indeed. Nothing quite like the return of a dear friend who you thought was lost to you.
Oz will be back on band lighting duties as soon as he's able. It's one of the things he's really been looking forward to. One way or another, we'll find ways around the logistical challenges to make that happen.
Happy Christmas everyone, & thank you for your kind wishes. I'd like to think it helped Oz in some way. We'll never know eh - but he beat the odds big time!