Francis Mammone
Donation protected
Helping Francis Mammone’s Family cope with the long road to recovery
The world was turned upside for Francis Mammone and his family when he was admitted to hospital on 11.09.2020. Francis has been recovering in ICU for the past 5 weeks with full recovery not expected for another 3 to 18 months.
About Francis Mammone
Anyone who has ever met Francis will know that he is a kind, generous and considerate person who is always willing to help others. He started his career at Compaq/HP 21 years ago in 1999 where he’s trained, coached and mentored so many people to progress and excel in their careers.
Even throughout his time at IBM and Lenovo (before eventually returning to HP 3 years ago) Francis has always maintained positive social and work relationships with current and former colleagues. He has a relentless “can do” attitude that he takes towards overcoming challenges and relationship management both with colleagues and his customers.
Francis treats everyone the way that he would want to the treated, with respect, enthusiasm and understanding. This probably resonated with a lot of people that Francis has interacted with over the past 30+ years because the outpouring of support and well wishes from so many people has been heart warming and reassuring to his family.
The Mammone Family
Francis is a loving, caring, and devoted father and husband. As you can imagine, this has been a terribly difficult time for Francis’ Family, his wife Ampha and son Rocco as well as for his elderly parents and older brother and sister.
Many of you may have seen Rocco’s face in Zoom meetings or on Francis’ screen saver in the office (pre COVID-19). Rocco just turned 5 in September and has been such a brave and thoughtful boy. Even though he misses Daddy very, very, very much, Rocco understands that Daddy is very sick and that it’s important for Daddy to stay at the hospital, so Rocco prays for Daddy to get extra/super better every night.
Ten years ago, when Ampha wanted to give up her career as a Corporate Lawyer to work at a local community charity, taking a massive pay cut, Francis was extremely supportive and became the main bread winner in the family.
This allowed Ampha to manage a team of youth workers/teachers to support over 33,000 disadvantaged Australian children including those from refugee or traumatic backgrounds to break the cycle of welfare dependency and disadvantage. This was only possible through Francis’ encouragement and support over the past decade.
Background – Why has Francis been in ICU for so long?
After taking 2 weeks off to recover from Chickenpox (also called varicella for which Francis had immunity/antibodies as a child) Francis was keen and ready to return to work on Monday.
However, on Friday 11th September 2020 Francis woke up with difficulty breathing and severe pins and needles in his arms and legs which progressed throughout the day and required him to be admitted to hospital.
After a series of tests and procedures to determine the exact cause of Francis’ rapid deterioration, particularly being unable to breathe and move his arms and legs, Francis was placed on a ventilator and admitted into ICU on Sunday 13th September.
What is GBS?
Following weeks of testing and treatments, Francis was diagnosed with Guillain-Barrè syndrome.
GBS is an autoimmune condition in which the person’s peripheral nerves are attacked by the body’s own immune defence system.
As a result of the attack, the nerve insulation (myelin) is damaged and signals are delayed/changed, causing paralysis and muscular weakness of the limbs. The syndrome appears to be triggered by acute viral illnesses, such as Chickenpox.
For more information about GBS see: http://www.guillainbarresyndrome.org/info-research/
What type of care is Francis receiving?
Francis is in the best care possible at Liverpool Hospital, led by the Neurology Team considered one of the best treatment facilities in Australia. In ICU he is getting 24 hour 1 to 1 care and has a team of 18 Senior Consultants (Doctors with 20 years+ experience) managing every aspect of Francis’ treatment.
With limited progress after 14 days on the ventilator Francis had a tracheostomy where a surgeon made a small opening, called a tracheostomy, into the windpipe at the base of the throat. The breathing tube is moved from the mouth to the tracheostomy.
It wasn’t until day 33 of his stay in ICU/Hospital that Francis demonstrated signs of positive progress, regaining use of his lungs and being able to lift his arm and legs.
Next Steps: The long road to recovery
The medical team can see Francis making a full recovery because GBS can be treated.
The recovery process is different for each individual, doctors have advised that Francis’ road to recovery will be long and slow, meaning anywhere from 3 to 18 months to learn to breathe, talk, walk and do other daily things independently (things that we all take for granted).
Francis’ family has been inundated with requests to visit Francis in hospital and would normally be thrilled by that, but due to COVID-19 restrictions a ‘one visitor per day’ rule applies. This means that only his immediate family has been allowed to visit and Rocco was given an exemption to visit Francis only on 3 out of the 38 days so far.
The next step is to move Francis out of ICU into a ward for several weeks then onto a rehabilitation facility. Hopefully by that stage the visitor restrictions will have been eased and more of his friends will be able to visit.
What can you do if you would like to help?
The uncertainty surrounding recovery time frames (3 to 18 months) adds to the stress that the family faces. The costs around post hospital rehabilitation and at home care and adjustments to the family home to increase his accessibility have been raised by the medical team in order to allow Francis to return home. Francis has just depleted his accrued sick leave, and the financial stress is now a real possibility and concern for his family, who are currently fully focussed on doing whatever it takes to help with Francis’ recovery.
Francis’ family is very grateful for the well wishes and messages of support. With so many people asking “how can they help” and wanting to send flowers (which the hospital doesn’t allow) and offering gifts/toys for Rocco, the family was urged to consider allowing this “Go Fund Me” page be set up to enable anyone wishing to contribute to do so in a meaningful way.
If you wish to contribute to this “go Fund Me” page as a gesture of your support to the Family, the funds will go towards making life a little less stressful for Francis’ family throughout his rehabilitation and it will be much appreciated. However, please know that your prayers and well wishes are enough and means the world to Francis and his family.
Thank you so much for your support and understanding, every day that we wake up being able to breathe on our own, talk and walk is a blessing.
The world was turned upside for Francis Mammone and his family when he was admitted to hospital on 11.09.2020. Francis has been recovering in ICU for the past 5 weeks with full recovery not expected for another 3 to 18 months.
About Francis Mammone
Anyone who has ever met Francis will know that he is a kind, generous and considerate person who is always willing to help others. He started his career at Compaq/HP 21 years ago in 1999 where he’s trained, coached and mentored so many people to progress and excel in their careers.
Even throughout his time at IBM and Lenovo (before eventually returning to HP 3 years ago) Francis has always maintained positive social and work relationships with current and former colleagues. He has a relentless “can do” attitude that he takes towards overcoming challenges and relationship management both with colleagues and his customers.
Francis treats everyone the way that he would want to the treated, with respect, enthusiasm and understanding. This probably resonated with a lot of people that Francis has interacted with over the past 30+ years because the outpouring of support and well wishes from so many people has been heart warming and reassuring to his family.
The Mammone Family
Francis is a loving, caring, and devoted father and husband. As you can imagine, this has been a terribly difficult time for Francis’ Family, his wife Ampha and son Rocco as well as for his elderly parents and older brother and sister.
Many of you may have seen Rocco’s face in Zoom meetings or on Francis’ screen saver in the office (pre COVID-19). Rocco just turned 5 in September and has been such a brave and thoughtful boy. Even though he misses Daddy very, very, very much, Rocco understands that Daddy is very sick and that it’s important for Daddy to stay at the hospital, so Rocco prays for Daddy to get extra/super better every night.
Ten years ago, when Ampha wanted to give up her career as a Corporate Lawyer to work at a local community charity, taking a massive pay cut, Francis was extremely supportive and became the main bread winner in the family.
This allowed Ampha to manage a team of youth workers/teachers to support over 33,000 disadvantaged Australian children including those from refugee or traumatic backgrounds to break the cycle of welfare dependency and disadvantage. This was only possible through Francis’ encouragement and support over the past decade.
Background – Why has Francis been in ICU for so long?
After taking 2 weeks off to recover from Chickenpox (also called varicella for which Francis had immunity/antibodies as a child) Francis was keen and ready to return to work on Monday.
However, on Friday 11th September 2020 Francis woke up with difficulty breathing and severe pins and needles in his arms and legs which progressed throughout the day and required him to be admitted to hospital.
After a series of tests and procedures to determine the exact cause of Francis’ rapid deterioration, particularly being unable to breathe and move his arms and legs, Francis was placed on a ventilator and admitted into ICU on Sunday 13th September.
What is GBS?
Following weeks of testing and treatments, Francis was diagnosed with Guillain-Barrè syndrome.
GBS is an autoimmune condition in which the person’s peripheral nerves are attacked by the body’s own immune defence system.
As a result of the attack, the nerve insulation (myelin) is damaged and signals are delayed/changed, causing paralysis and muscular weakness of the limbs. The syndrome appears to be triggered by acute viral illnesses, such as Chickenpox.
For more information about GBS see: http://www.guillainbarresyndrome.org/info-research/
What type of care is Francis receiving?
Francis is in the best care possible at Liverpool Hospital, led by the Neurology Team considered one of the best treatment facilities in Australia. In ICU he is getting 24 hour 1 to 1 care and has a team of 18 Senior Consultants (Doctors with 20 years+ experience) managing every aspect of Francis’ treatment.
With limited progress after 14 days on the ventilator Francis had a tracheostomy where a surgeon made a small opening, called a tracheostomy, into the windpipe at the base of the throat. The breathing tube is moved from the mouth to the tracheostomy.
It wasn’t until day 33 of his stay in ICU/Hospital that Francis demonstrated signs of positive progress, regaining use of his lungs and being able to lift his arm and legs.
Next Steps: The long road to recovery
The medical team can see Francis making a full recovery because GBS can be treated.
The recovery process is different for each individual, doctors have advised that Francis’ road to recovery will be long and slow, meaning anywhere from 3 to 18 months to learn to breathe, talk, walk and do other daily things independently (things that we all take for granted).
Francis’ family has been inundated with requests to visit Francis in hospital and would normally be thrilled by that, but due to COVID-19 restrictions a ‘one visitor per day’ rule applies. This means that only his immediate family has been allowed to visit and Rocco was given an exemption to visit Francis only on 3 out of the 38 days so far.
The next step is to move Francis out of ICU into a ward for several weeks then onto a rehabilitation facility. Hopefully by that stage the visitor restrictions will have been eased and more of his friends will be able to visit.
What can you do if you would like to help?
The uncertainty surrounding recovery time frames (3 to 18 months) adds to the stress that the family faces. The costs around post hospital rehabilitation and at home care and adjustments to the family home to increase his accessibility have been raised by the medical team in order to allow Francis to return home. Francis has just depleted his accrued sick leave, and the financial stress is now a real possibility and concern for his family, who are currently fully focussed on doing whatever it takes to help with Francis’ recovery.
Francis’ family is very grateful for the well wishes and messages of support. With so many people asking “how can they help” and wanting to send flowers (which the hospital doesn’t allow) and offering gifts/toys for Rocco, the family was urged to consider allowing this “Go Fund Me” page be set up to enable anyone wishing to contribute to do so in a meaningful way.
If you wish to contribute to this “go Fund Me” page as a gesture of your support to the Family, the funds will go towards making life a little less stressful for Francis’ family throughout his rehabilitation and it will be much appreciated. However, please know that your prayers and well wishes are enough and means the world to Francis and his family.
Thank you so much for your support and understanding, every day that we wake up being able to breathe on our own, talk and walk is a blessing.
Organizer and beneficiary
Adrian Thake
Organizer
Pennant Hills, NSW
Ampha Mammone
Beneficiary