For anyone who has suffered a debilitating injury, you know how important the doctors and nurses of rehabilitation medicine are. Therapists and medical professionals dedicate their time to make sure we recover to the best of our ability. This is Rehab Week, a time to recognize those accomplishments.
For a stroke patient, something as simple as climbing a flight of stairs or walking a short distance can be a huge hurdle. Thanks to rehabilitation, relearning those skills is possible.
Sixty-two-year-old Barb Ray is taking one step at a time.
“Good Job!”
“Yeah?”
"Yeah!”
She's been at Methodist Hospital since the end of August after suffering a stroke. “I tend to move to the right, so we're working on my mobility and stability and trying to keep me centered, in the middle, which sounds like it should be very easy to do and some days it is and some days it's not,” says Ray, who will be able to go home this week after weeks of dedication from both her and her physical therapy assistant.
“She's awesome to work with, they all are,” says physical therapy assistant Liz Seeley. “Attitude, like she said, makes the world of difference.” Pushing past frustrations and working together to reach goals. “You can do it.”
"I have a son and I have a grandson and a husband to go home to and lots of friends and family,” says Ray. “I'm not ready to call it quits so I'm going to go home and take care of myself.”
“We work as such an awesome team here and everybody's focus is the patient and that patient getting better and meeting goals that the patient has set for themselves,” says rehabilitation nurse Jill Beckstrom.
Dr. Jose Poblador says in Ray's case, the quicker therapy can begin, the better. “It forces the brain to make the right connections in order to preform those activities that they're being challenged with.”
Ray will carry all of the rehabilitation team's efforts with her as she continues on her path. “I would hate to think where people would end up if there wasn't a place like this to come to.”
Ray will continue her therapy at home in Red Oak, Iowa and at the hospital there. The Methodist rehabilitation team has 18 therapists and 25 nurses helping patients.
