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Oranmore teen tells story to raise meningitis awareness
It’s your worst nightmare – waking up in agony, with your face swollen and throat closing – but imagine if, up to that point, you were a perfectly healthy 17 year old without a medical worry in the world.
That was Hazel Keenan a year ago, was told she had everything from the mumps, to a brain haemorrhage or tumour to Multiple Sclerosis and Bechet’s Disease – until tests finally established she had contracted meningitis.
And now the Oranmore teenager now wants to tell her story to raise awareness of the illness – something she has taken very much to heart through her voluntary work with her local charity ACT for Meningitis.
Hazel remembers the drama that began on an ordinary Monday morning; “I had woken up and the left side of my face was all swollen,” she says.
Hazel on one of her many hospita stays.
As the pain progressed through the day, her father, Ciarán, called their local GP and she was squeezed in for an appointment. There, she was diagnosed with a case of the mumps.
“I was just told to take Nurofen, avoid fizzy drinks and stay in the house for the week,” Hazel says.
The GP advised to go straight back in if she started to suffer a headache – by the following Friday, her pain had become unbearable.
“I woke up with an excruciating headache and a very stiff neck. I got up out of the bed and felt extremely weak.
“My eyes started becoming extremely sensitive to the light,” she says – so sitting under the fluorescent lights of the waiting room was agonising.
With a progressive and unyielding headache, extreme weakness and sensitivity to light, Hazel’s GP sent her straight to A&E.
“I was made wear a mask and put straight into isolation in the A&E Department. At this stage I was vomiting, the headache became absolutely unbearable and I was shaking with the cold even though I was wrapped in loads of blankets.
“My neck was barely moveable and I had to ask Mam to turn all the lights off and pull the blinds down in the room as even just a small beam of light was causing pain in the eyes.
“The pain, I honestly couldn’t put it into words, I thought my head was going to explode. You can actually feel your brain swelling – it’s horrific!” she recalls.
Meningitis is an inflammation of the meninges – a collective name for the three membranes that envelope the brain and spinal cord. It can be caused by several different organisms – some bacterial, some viral.
Bacterial meningitis is less common but can be very serious and requires immediate medical attention and treatment with antibiotics. Viral Meningitis is less serious, but cannot be helped by antibiotic treatment.
Viral and bacterial meningitis present similar symptoms and so hospital tests may be need to be carried out to differentiate the two.
Anything less than an immediate response can result in lifelong suffering, as Hazel well knows – having suffered four relapses in the space of six months, the hospital is considered her “second home”.
On that first visit, Hazel waited over three hours in A&E with her mother, Michelle, before spending another few hours waiting on a trolley.
When a medical team came around to see her they insisted she have an immediate lumber puncture. This was to prove another source of trauma – because the local anaesthetic didn’t take.
“It was so painful I could not lay still, so the doctor could not draw any fluid from my spinal cord,” she says.
Hazel was put on the emergency list for theatre, where she had the lumber puncture under general anaesthetic. The results were back within the hour – meningitis.
However doctors did not confirm whether she had contacted bacterial or viral meningitis, and they weren’t taking any chances. “Straight away I was given antibiotics through IV,” says Hazel.
It was a battle that required a two week hospital stint, on a double dosage of antibiotics per day.
Leaving hospital a fortnight later, she thought the spell had passed – but she was in for another rude awakening.
“Since suffering meningitis I have been hospitalised four times in the space of six months with severe headaches, bleeding from the ears, leg weakness and loss of sight in my right eye,” she says.
In fact, she has lost a staggering 73% vision in her right eye.
Hazel is resigned to the fact that she will live with the side effects of meningitis every day – but she has decided to turn a negative into a positive.
Her role as a Volunteer Fundraising Coordinator with ACT for Meningitis has provided her with a platform to turn a “traumatic experience” into something positive – helping many others along the way.
“I am so proud to be working to help make a difference to those affected by meningitis and to create a greater awareness around the signs and symptoms of the disease,” she says.
ACT for Meningitis offers a wide range of free support services to people affected by meningitis. “One in three people who survive Meningitis are left with life term side effects,” they say.
Children up to the age of five are most at risk, signs to look out for include; babies being irritable, refusing to eat, (excessively) high pitched crying, rapid breathing, bulging soft spot on head and cold hands and feet.
ACT for Meningitis is currently running ‘ACTion Teds National Pyjama Party’ in crèches across the country during February and March to raise awareness of meningitis and funds for the charity – and to ensure parents know that meningitis is the largest killer of children under five in Ireland.
For further information visit their website, checkout their Facebook page or contact the office on (091) 380058. To support the ACT for Meningitis, text ACT to 50300 to donate €4.
And the ACT for Meningitis annual 5k run/walk andd 3k/16k/3k Duathlon are now open for registration; supported by DFS & Co Accountants Galway and Educogym Galway, these time chipped events take place in Renville Park, on Sunday, April 3, with all funds raised going directly to ACT for Meningitis.
Significant state investment is required to address ‘shocking’ inequalities that leave cancer patients in the West at greater risk of succumbing to the disease.
A meeting of Regional Health Forum West heard that survival rates for breast, lung and colorectal cancers than the national average, and with the most deprived quintile of the population, the West’s residents faced poorer outcomes from a cancer diagnosis.
For breast cancer patients, the five-year survival rate was 80% in the West versus 85% nationally; for lung cancer patients it was 16.7% in the west against a 19.5% national survival rate; and in the West’s colorectal cancer patients, there was a 62.6% survival rate where the national average was 63.1%.
These startling statistics were provided in answer to a question from Ballinasloe-based Cllr Evelyn Parsons (Ind) who said it was yet another reminder that cancer treatment infrastructure in the West was in dire need of improvement.
“The situation is pretty stark. In the Western Regional Health Forum area, we have the highest incidence of deprivation and the highest health inequalities because of that – we have the highest incidences of cancer nationally because of that,” said Cllr Parsons, who is also a general practitioner.
In details provided by CEO of Saolta Health Care Group, which operates Galway’s hospitals, it was stated that a number of factors were impacting on patient outcomes.
Get the full story in this week’s Connacht Tribune, on sale in shops now, or you can download the digital edition from www.connachttribune.ie. You can also download our Connacht Tribune App from Apple’s App Store or get the Android Version from Google Play.
On the eve of completing his 150th marathon, an odyssey that has taken him across 53 countries, Loughrea’s Marathon Man has announced that he is planning to hang up his running shoes.
But not before Jarlath Fitzgerald completes another ten races, making it 160 marathons on the occasion of his 60th birthday.
“I want to draw the line in 2026. I turn 57 in October and when I reach 60 it’s the finishing line. The longer races are taking it out of me. I did 20 miles there two weeks ago and didn’t feel good. It’s getting harder,” he reveals.
“I’ve arthritis in both hips and there’s wear and tear in the knees.”
We speak as he is about to head out for a run before his shift in Supervalu Loughrea. Despite his physical complaints, he still clocks up 30 miles every second week and generally runs four days a week.
Jarlath receives injections to his left hip to keep the pain at bay while running on the road.
To give his joints a break, during the winter he runs cross country and often does a five-mile trek around Kylebrack Wood.
He is planning on running his 150th marathon in Cork on June 4, where a group of 20 made up of work colleagues, friends and running mates from Loughrea Athletics Club will join him.
Some are doing the 10k, others are doing the half marathon, but all will be there on the finishing line to cheer him on in the phenomenal achievement.
Get the full story in this week’s Connacht Tribune, on sale in shops now, or you can download the digital edition from www.connachttribune.ie. You can also download our Connacht Tribune App from Apple’s App Store or get the Android Version from Google Play.
From the Galway City Tribune – An impassioned plea for a ‘masterplan’ that would guide Galway City into the future has been made in the Dáil. Galway West TD Catherine Connolly stated this week that there needed to be an all-inclusive approach with “vision and leadership” in order to build a sustainable city.
Deputy Connolly spoke at length at the crisis surrounding traffic and housing in Galway city and said that not all of the blame could be laid at the door of the local authority.
She said that her preference would be the provision of light rail as the main form of public transport, but that this would have to be driven by the government.
“I sat on the local council for 17 years and despaired at all of the solutions going down one road, metaphorically and literally. In 2005 we put Park & Ride into the development plan, but that has not been rolled out. A 2016 transport strategy was outdated at the time and still has not been updated.
“Due to the housing crisis in the city, a task force was set up in 2019. Not a single report or analysis has been published on the cause of the crisis,” added Deputy Connolly.
She then referred to a report from the Land Development Agency (LDA) that identified lands suitable for the provision of housing. But she said that two-thirds of these had significant problems and a large portion was in Merlin Park University Hospital which, she said, would never have housing built on it.
In response, Minister Simon Harris spoke of the continuing job investment in the city and also in higher education, which is his portfolio.
But turning his attention to traffic congestion, he accepted that there were “real issues” when it came to transport, mobility and accessibility around Galway.
“We share the view that we need a Park & Ride facility and I understand there are also Bus Connects plans.
“I also suggest that the City Council reflect on her comments. I am proud to be in a Government that is providing unparalleled levels of investment to local authorities and unparalleled opportunities for local authorities to draw down,” he said.
Then Minister Harris referred to the controversial Galway City Outer Ring Road which he said was “struck down by An Bord Pleanála”, despite a lot of energy having been put into that project.
However, Deputy Connolly picked up on this and pointed out that An Bord Pleanála did not say ‘No’ to the ring road.
“The High Court said ‘No’ to the ring road because An Bord Pleanála acknowledged it failed utterly to consider climate change and our climate change obligations.
“That tells us something about An Bord Pleanála and the management that submitted such a plan.”
In the end, Minister Harris agreed that there needed to be a masterplan for Galway City.
“I suggest it is for the local authority to come up with a vision and then work with the Government to try to fund and implement that.”
Families queue up for school’s offer of free house
West has lower cancer survival rates than rest
Galway minors continue to lay waste to all opponents
Gardaí and IFA issue a joint appeal on summer road safety
Marathon Man plans to call a halt – but not before he hits 160 races
