Scrape with killer bug leaves Waikato mum paralysed

By CATHY ARONSON

MATAMATA - Mary van Huysen is stunned that her pelvis may be permanently paralysed as a result of treatment for a disease she might not have.

When she arrived at Waikato Hospital on July 21, three technicians treated Ms van Huysen with the antibiotic amphotericin B, believing they had seen the usually lethal amoebic meningitis strand, Naegleria flowleri, in spinal fluid samples.

The morning after the drug was injected through a lumbar puncture, the Matamata 37-year-old mother of four awoke paralysed from the waist down.

Six weeks later, she is walking without the aid of crutches but cannot tiptoe or walk backwards without losing her balance.

But the former triathlete and aerobics instructor refuses to believe her latest advice from doctors that she may never regain feeling in her pelvic area.

"It feels like I have been sitting on snow for three hours and they say the longer it stays the less likely I will have a full recovery, but I'm not going for that one."

Hospital clinical microbiologist Dr Ron Leng says it is unclear if Ms van Huysen ever had amoebic meningitis.

She had been taken to the hospital after suffering from a headache. The antibiotic treatment continued for two weeks before she was discharged.

But Dr Leng says further analysis of the samples cannot confirm that the meningitis was Naegleria flowleri.

No photographs or videos were taken of the initial sample and the hospital has run out of samples to conduct further tests.

"Whether it was right or wrong, the fact remains that the risk of not treating her was too great to ignore and the choice was the right one."

Ms van Huysen says she cannot believe that she might have been treated for something she did not have, but she is not bitter about the decision.

"It makes no difference to me now. I'm still like this. Hindsight is all very well but I don't want a witch-hunt. The specialists did what they could with the information they had."

Ms van Huysen exercises her legs every day and is visited by a physiotherapist twice a week.

She says she would not have been able to regain movement in her legs without the help of her husband, Tony Wright, and more than 10 volunteers who take rotated half-day shifts to help the family.

But despite the assistance, the financial strain has not helped her recovery as ACC have still not accepted her claim.

Mr Wright took a month off work and is now working part-time to help with the house and children. "I'm just happy to have her home and alive."

Both parents say the children's routine has been disrupted by the traumatic events, but the youngsters have also been their inspiration.

If Ms van Huysen did have amoebic meningitis then she would be one of five in the world to survive the disease out of the 180 recorded cases. The disease has killed 10 New Zealanders in the past 32 years.