Last week's Catalyst programme on ABC television featured a repeat of the Luke Wilmot story. I taught Luke at Willetton Senior High. He was not able to do much and had a full time carer looking after him. It was obvious that Luke had a functioning brain somewhere in there despite the uncontrolled gyrations and garbled speech. I was amazed to see the transformation of Luke due to an operation called Deep Brain Stimulation. The programme had footage of him as I remember him and Luke as he is now, driving a car, riding a bicycle and studying at TAFE.
Luke was suffering from Generalised Dystonia.
Our brother in law Michael who has advanced Parkinson's Disease is now a patient of the same surgeon and has this last week been accepted into the Deep Brain Stimulation programme. The surgeon has assessed him as being an ideal candidate and he is now on a waiting list. The surgeon is the only person doing this operation in W.A. and Mike has been told there is a 10-12 month waiting list. Hang in there mate.
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