We often share eye-opening stories and talk a lot about the potential side effects of some medications – especially ones that have become commonplace and are prescribed so freely. The story we're sharing today further highlights the potentially fatal dangers of painkillers that are currently on the market.
In January 2017, then-8-year-old Alexa Juckiewicz-Caspell from Essex, United Kingdom was diagnosed with a chronic pain condition known as Trigeminal Neuralgia (TN).
It affects the trigeminal nerve, which is responsible for carrying facial sensations to your brain. (Although, the true cause of trigeminal neuralgia is unclear.) People with TN who experience facial stimulation from something as simple as eating, shaving, applying eye cream, or brushing your teeth can suffer from bouts of agonizing jolt of pain.
Treatments vary from person to person because of different pain thresholds and that fact that TN tends to worsen over time. Usually, doctors will use anticonvulsant medication (i.e., for epilepsy) to help dull or numb the nervous system and reduce pain.
In a desperate act to keep her alive, doctors put Alexa in a medically-induced coma.
She spent the majority of the following six weeks in hospital. During this time, "[Alexa] had to kept in the burn unit as they scrubbed her body of the burned skin, shaved her head and wrapped her in foil. It took them two weeks to get her eyes open," along with her lips, which had become glued shut as a result of her condition.
Over a year later, Alexa is back in school but it's not all perfect. Many of her days are filled with doctor and specialist appointments, certain physical tasks are difficult because she gets weak quickly, and she has had to relearn basics such as breathing on her own, talking, talking, and eating. But her friends, family, and doctors are all baffled by how determined she has been and continues to be through her recovery.
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