‘One minute I was washing up, the next I was on the floor and I couldn’t feel my legs’
Towards the end of May this year, Declan Tidswell, from the Wirral, was pottering around the kitchen one night after making a meal. The next thing he remembers is waking up on the kitchen floor without any feeling in his legs below the knees.
The 33-year-old said: “One minute I was washing up, the next I was on the floor and couldn’t feel my legs. I live alone, and wasn’t able to move. I had no idea what was going on and it took a while to let family know what was going on for help.”
Declan, who is an IT Product Manager, was rushed to Arrowe Park Hospital in an ambulance, where they scanned him and found a large tumour on the upper part of the spine. After this discovery, Declan was rushed to The Walton Centre as an emergency.
Declan said: “By the time I got to The Walton Centre, the paralysis had started to move up my body. It was scary, but the staff were so reassuring and I ended up in surgery really quickly.”
The tumour on Declan’s spine is called a Chondrosarcoma, a rare form of bone cancer, where 10% of cases in the UK occur in the spine – making it even more rare.
Due to the uncommon tumour wrapped around Declan’s spine, Consultant Neurosurgeon Mr Martin Wilby approached The Royal Orthopaedic Hospital in Birmingham for support on how to treat and remove the tumour.
Mr Wilby said: “With tumours that occur within the spine, there are a number of factors that can have life-changing implications on a patient’s outcome. In cases where the tumour compresses the spinal cord, as in Declan’s case, speed is of the essence and removing as much of the tumour as possible is the goal.
“Tumours can cause pressure on the nerves in the spine or spinal cord, and even if it is removed quickly, it can cause lasting damage and paralysis. Unfortunately, the spinal cord does not repair itself and compression injury is often permanent.”
During surgery, a cage was inserted into Declan’s spine and as much of the tumour as possible was removed to aid his recovery. Some remains, and is being treated by The Royal Orthopaedic Hospital in Birmingham.
Declan continued: “It all happened really quickly. I woke up after the operation and the team told me I was in a stable condition. The paralysis stops at my chest, so my rehabilitation was hard, but very positive. The staff around me, from the clinical staff on Dott Ward to the different therapies getting me mobile and supporting me, were excellent.
“I couldn’t thank the teams enough. The support and reassurance they give my family and friends was amazing. The relationships I built in the hospital made my stay strangely enjoyable. With a life changing situation, the environment was fantastic and there was a lot more laughter than tears.”
“After five months, I’m back home now, waiting for further treatment and adapting to a new way of life. But I cannot thank the team at The Walton Centre enough. I feel like my recovery would’ve been much longer, harder had the specialist hospital not been there - giving me that extra push each day.”
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Notes to editors
Further information, or to arrange an interview, please contact the Communications Team at The Walton Centre on 0151 556 3397 or wcft.communications@nhs.net
The Walton Centre NHS Foundation Trust is the only hospital trust in the UK specialising in neurology, neurosurgery and pain services. Although the majority of patients come from Merseyside, Cheshire, North Wales, Lancashire and the Isle of Man, for some specialist treatments of complex disorders we see patients from all parts of the country, referred by their GPs or other neurologists, neurosurgeons and pain clinicians.
The Walton Centre NHS Foundation Trust was rated as ‘Outstanding’ by the Care Quality Commission. The independent regulator of all health and social care services in England published its rating on Friday 21 October 2016, following announced and unannounced inspection visits to the Trust in April 2016.
For more information please visit: www.thewaltoncentre.nhs.uk or follow the Trust on X, Facebook, LinkedIn or Instagram.
The Walton Centre NHS Foundation Trust, Lower Lane, Fazakerley, Liverpool L9 7LJ
0151 525 3611