A mother left ‘screaming in pain’ and looking ‘possessed’ from muscle spasms over half of her body has been told doctors are clueless as to what is wrong with her.
‘Strong and fit’ pub worker Sadie Slattery used to love kickboxing and said ‘anything a man can do I can do too’.
But in March last year, the 41-year-old woke up with a twitch in her arm and she dismissed it as having ‘slept funny’.
And within a month it drastically escalated to her entire arm spasming and her hand was locked into a ‘claw’.
Since then, she has been admitted to A&E 11 times but doctors could only say that a signal in her brain was causing it. A private consultant was left ‘gobsmacked’ and said he has never seen a case so bad.
When the mother was brought to A&E, she was told it was unsafe for her to be in a bed because of her spasms, so was either left on the floor with a blanket chucked over her, or on a mattress at best.
Being left on the floor has caused horrendous bruising, carpet burns and sores to her skin, with wait times stretching from seven hours to 14-and-a-half.
She is unable to complete the simplest of tasks such as bathing or feeding herself, and has gone months without seeing her 12-year-old son who has ADHD because she is worried that seeing her in this state would trigger him.
‘Strong and fit’ pub worker Sadie Slattery used to love kickboxing and said ‘anything a man can do I can do too’. But she has been to A&E eleven times and forced to lie on the floor for hours
Her friends and family are agonised, forced to see their ‘strong and bubbly’ Sadie in so much pain
Being left on the floor has caused horrendous bruising, carpet burns and sores to her skin
Her friends and family are agonised, forced to see their ‘strong and bubbly’ Sadie in so much pain.
They have set up a GoFundMe to help pay for private medical care to get her some help and hopefully some answers.
Claire Birch, who set up the page, told MailOnline that Sadie’s muscles ‘look like stone’ in her neck, making her ‘look like the Hulk’.
She said: ‘She can’t sit up, she can’t walk for more than 10 steps. Her back arches up like she is possessed, it looks like she is doing the crab.
‘One person thought she was a mental health patient in A&E because she was crawling around on her hands and knees screaming in pain.’
The pal said the average wait time in A&E is between seven and nine hours. The longest was 14 and a half hours, where Sadie was left on the floor in ‘excruciating pain’.
Claire added: ‘We paid £250 for a private consultant and they said it is spreading like wildfire through her body.
‘I don’t know how she is still going. She is as strong as an ox but we are just going around in circles.
‘She’s housebound in Torbay and can’t travel to appointments, she has to lie flat on her back on the backseat of my car or get an ambulance.
‘She’s currently on a 16-month waiting list for an appointment with a pain management team.’
Pictured is one of the carpet burns caused by being on the floor in hospital
Claire said they reached out to their local MP Steve Darling in desperation, and he is looking in to the situation to see if there is anything to be done
Claire said they reached out to their local MP Steve Darling in desperation, and he is looking in to the situation to see if there is anything to be done.
Sadie has had CT scans and MRI scans which had to be done under general anaesthetic as she couldn’t keep still enough due to her spasms.
Her 21-year-old daughter Brittany posted on Facebook pleading for help.
She said in a touching post: ‘I am asking anyone to please give me any sort of advice as I cannot continue to watch her in this much pain and not live her life due to this.
‘She now has carpet burns all over her body due to her rolling around on the floor in pain until she wears herself out and falls to sleep.
‘She’s been on waiting list after waiting list and no one knows what is wrong with her.
‘I’ve taken her to appointment after appointment and everyone keeps getting it wrong and referring her elsewhere which ends up as a dead end.’
Sadie said: ‘I’ve had enough. I just want my life back.
‘My daughter has been my absolute rock through most of this journey so far. I’ve hated every second of her seeing me at my weakest, but I have come to realise I’ve got a really strong caring daughter.’
MailOnline has contacted the NHS for comment.
You can donate to the GoFundMe here.
[Notigroup Newsroom in collaboration with other media outlets, with information from the following sources]
