 As a full-service community hospital and regional medical center, Kent continues to expand its commitment to patients stricken by stroke or brain attack, the third leading cause of death in the United States and the number one cause of serious, lifelong disability. Kent’s comprehensive approach to stroke combines prevention, immediate and direct acute intervention and goal-oriented rehabilitation. The Rehabilitation Center at Kent Hospital works daily with people like Joseph Soares of East Greenwich, who suffered a devastating stroke that left him paralyzed on his right side.
After a lengthy inpatient stay at Kent, Joseph was able to walk again but still needed a lot of help to build up strength, regain mobility and tackle activities of daily living that once were routine. Enter the multi-disciplinary team of the Rehabilitation Center at Kent, a state-of –the-art outpatient facility conveniently located in East Greenwich, a few short miles from the hospital’s main campus in Warwick. Joseph picks up the story.
“When I found out I’d had a stroke and was paralyzed on my right side, I was frightened but determined to get better,” he said. “I decided that I was going to walk out of the hospital and after more than a month at Kent, I did.” When Joseph returned home, he continued the road back to recovery with personalized outpatient therapy from the Rehabilitation Center at Kent, three times a week for two hours a day. He had speech therapy so he could learn to talk again. “I worked with (therapists) Carl and Jerome and did foot work, weights and presses, and by the end I could press 80 pounds with my right leg,” Joseph recalled. “I continued with occupational therapy to get back my fine motor skills. This was important because as a plumber, I needed those skills to do my job.” He said the only time he wanted to quit was when his therapist Nancy gave him a pile of nickels, quarters, dimes, pennies and paper clips to sort. “I looked at her and said, ‘I can’t do this.’ And she looked at me and said, ‘There is no such word as quit!’”
When he first began his therapy, Joseph said he saw nothing, but then week-by-week he recognized progress. He learned to welcome each therapy session because “the more you get, the better you are, and if you give up, you lose all your muscles. You can’t get discouraged: attitude means so much.” In the end, Joseph looks back with pride on his accomplishments and his ability to return to a full and productive lifestyle thanks to his own determination and the skill and dedication of the stroke rehabilitation team at the Rehabilitation Center at Kent. “I thank God every day for Kent because without them I would have been paralyzed,” he said. “After just five months, I was back at work and could even drive a car. I feel very positive about going to Kent and I wouldn’t go anywhere else. I look at life 100% differently now.”
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