Janna’s Ongoing Journey
Janna was born with cerebral palsy. Birthing complications left Janna without oxygen for too long, leading to a CP diagnosis as a newborn baby. She started physical therapy at the age of two, and since childhood has undergone four hip surgeries.
When Janna and her grandmother, Jannice, arrived at Oxford Recovery Center, Janna couldn’t use her right leg, she had just broken her femur, and she was in too much pain to even be able to touch her leg. She always fought going to therapy because she knew it was painful and she felt like it was work.
However, Hyperbaric Oxygen Therapy was miraculous for Janna. After her fourth dive, she said the pain in her leg was completely gone.
During their time at Oxford, Janna also participated in our full Cerebral Palsy program, which combines multiple therapies for a synergistic approach to recovery.
Her grandma recalls how amazing it was to see Janna with multiple therapists doing Intensive Physical Therapy, Occupational Therapy, Speech Therapy, and enjoying Music Therapy–all at the same time. She says that Janna’s condition improved by leaps and bounds because of the combination of therapies and having each therapy easily accessible in the same facility. She said she experienced more improvements and accomplishments at a faster rate at ORC than she did at any of Janna’s other therapy facilities
One of the most heartwarming aspects of Janna’s story is not only the improvements with her cerebral palsy, but also the impact she had on Oxford.
Her huge smiles, even larger bows, and spunky sense of humor left all of our staff smiling at the end of every day. Janna had fun pranking her grandmother with the help of her favorite HBOT techs–Blake and Andrew.
To this day, Janna still texts and FaceTimes some of our staff members. Priya, her physical therapist, even drove down to Janna’s hometown to take her and her grandmother to see Frozen 2 when it was released.
Janna finished her 40 dives in October of 2019, but both she and her grandmother are hoping to come back soon for another round of therapy for maintenance. Janna recently underwent another hip surgery and is again experiencing complications from the surgery.
Even Jannice benefitted from Janna’s treatments, as she went into the chamber with Janna for each dive and by the end of the 40 treatments, she said that the arthritis pain she’d had in her back for 20+ years had disappeared because of HBOT.
At Oxford, our patients mean the world to us and often become a part of our family and stay in our hearts well past their last treatment. You can still find photos of Janna on cabinet doors and on staff members’ desks throughout the center.
Photos courtesy of Janna’s grandmother, Jannice.
