Funds Needed for Anna to Continue her Stroke Rehabilitation

GoFundMe Main Page, Story, MAY 2025

We are urgently seeking £20,000 to continue Anna’s Stroke rehabilitation.

We are very grateful for the NHS for saving her life, and the excellent treatment and care she received at Bristol Southmead Hospital. However, after returning to London in February, she was not offered the intensive inpatient rehabilitation she needed, and we made the decision to take her to Hungary where rehabilitation services are better. We have to pay private fees there at all health facts Anna is not entitled their state-run health services, but the fee is about one tenth of what it would be in the UK.

We started this fundraising project in February, and thanks to the incredible generosity of supporters, Anna has now almost completed the first stage of her intensive in-patient rehabilitation in Hungary. She will be discharged on the 2nd of June 2025.

We are very grateful for everyone who has already contributed. But we now need to raise a further £20,000 to fund the next stage, which is expected to last over a year.

Her Physiotherapy would be at the renowned Peto Institute in Hungary, where costs are a fraction of UK private rehab. In addition she will need regular Speech and Language Therapy sessions and some other medical and rehabilitative professional input - all on a private basis.

Sadly in England, after her planned discharge in February, the NHS could only promise to provide three short therapy sessions per week, and only for up to a month, far short of the 1.5 years of rehabilitation, which experts say, she needs in order to recover from paralysis and to re-learn to speak normally.

CURRENT PROGRESS

After her Neuro-Surgeon feared Anna might never be able to speak or to move her right side again — she’s making amazing progress.

It is true, initially she could not speak or move her right limbs at all. Thankfully, after about a month, she started to regain some movement in her right leg and arm, and we observed the gradual return of her normal thinking abilities, her usual consciousness and her personality.

Anna's talking is still very limited, but there's slow and stable progress — she is now able to speak short sentences when given enough time. She has now regained enough control of her right leg to walk slowly and short distances, but unfortunately her right foot is still paralysed. She is now able to move her right shoulder and elbow, but she is still unable to use her right hand, however the good news is that after extensive physiotherapy and robotics-therapy she has learned to move her right fingers a couple of cm.

Her progress so far gives us real hope that with the continuation of expert Physio and Speech therapy, she may be able to fully recover.

THE STROKE AND RECOVERY SO FAR

Anna is my clever, beautiful, amazing daughter. She was born in London in 1979 and she has lived in England all her life. Last year she was working in Bath, while studying to become a Complementary Medicine Practitioner. She was living an active and healthy life until she suddenly collapsed on the street on the 21st of December 2024, suffering a major brain rupture. She had AVM, which means, she had an arteriovenous malformation in her brain which led to sudden bleeding and a major Stroke.

Following a 6-hour-long brain surgery and another smaller surgery some days later, she was placed in an induced coma and on a ventilator. She then developed serious chest infections twice and was critically ill. During the fourth week, she gradually started the long process of recovery.

In early February 2025, she was transferred by ambulance from Bristol Southmead Hospital to London Lewisham Hospital, where she stayed on an acute Stroke Ward. Unfortunately, she was only given minimal rehabilitation therapies, and they wanted to discharge her before she could even walk unassisted.

As the NHS offered only minimal rehabilitation, we decided to drive her to Hungary, where there are excellent, and relatively affordable private rehabilitation services. Anna is half-Hungarian; before the Stroke she could speak Hungarian fluently.

We started this fundraising in February 2025 to get the funds needed for Anna's rehabilitation in Hungary. With the help of donations, we have managed to pay for her intensive inpatient rehabilitation for 3 months in Hungary.

In March Anna spent four weeks at the St Vincent Rehabilitation Centre in Szeged. Early April she was accepted at the excellent National Medical Rehabilitation Hospital in Budakeszi.

However, we have now run out of money, and she will be discharged on the 2nd of June.

DONATIONS ARE EXTREMELY APPRECIATED

When the Stroke happened Anna was working on a self-employed basis and without sick pay. She has no savings or assets and has had no income for four months now.

I am a retired social worker with no savings, and I am currently supporting Anna financially from my pension for her everyday needs, but I have no extra money to pay for her rehabilitation.

All doctors and professionals agree that Anna has amazing rehabilitation potential, and she is highly motivated. Since we arrived in Hungary she has had the right help, but her progress is partly due to her determination, her own hard and painful work to achieve real change in her condition.

She is a very independent person who wants to stand on her own feet as soon as possible.

We would be grateful for any amount of donation—every penny counts.

Piroska Markus (Mother)