WARNING GRAPHIC IMAGES
His skin turned purple, his eyes dilated and he was rushed to hospital, where staff later told his partner Lucy Townsend, he wouldn't make it.
But he survived and hopes one day to walk again on prosthetic 'blade runner' legs.
Mr Lewis, from Stockbridge, Hants, said: "In a strange way it is the most amazing thing I have ever lived through.
"I think nothing but good will come from it. I think you cope because you have to. If you don't, chances are you will probably die.
"We have all got a resilience within us but it just doesn’t get tested. As a family we have been tested in the last four months to the max.
"But you have to make the best of the situation, realise what you have got, not what you haven’t got."
Miss Townsend, who owns Michelin Pub of the Year The Greyhound on the Test, in their village, said she was warned she could lose her partner last November.
Miss Townsend, aged in her early 40s, said: "All his internal organs broke down so he was straight on dialysis.
"His kidneys were the first to stop. Then his lungs, his kidneys, his heart followed.
"Everything was shutting down so when we got to intensive care they said 'go and say goodbye', basically.
"They took me to a room and told me there was a three per cent chance of his survival.
"They said if he makes it through the night he will be lucky. It was just so surreal.
"Hours earlier he had been at home with Sam and now here he was fighting for his life."
Gangrene set in as Mr Lewis was treated at Royal County Hospital, in Winchester, Hants.
But he pulled through and was transferred to Salisbury District Hospital, Wilts, and told there was only one option to save his life - amputation.
Surgeons cut off his three limbs and even took muscle from his back to rebuild his dead right arm in a series of gruelling operations.
They hope he may one day regain feeling in his right hand, after completing the work last month.
Next, he will be transferred to a specialist unit to be fitted with prosthetic limbs and undergo rehabilitation.
Mr Lewis said: "I've got no use of my fingers yet, but they hope in time the tendons and muscles will finally work their way through.
"I may get the use of my thumb and forefinger but otherwise it may be another amputation.
"The fact I have my hand is amazing.
"I've learned along the way that all the quadruple amputees I've met through either war or illness say the one thing they'd kill for is a hand.
"So I was very lucky that surgeons here could save it."
Mr Lewis said his three-year-old son Sam's reaction when he lost his lips was worse than the excrutiating pain and the 14inch scar on his back from the operation.
Mr Lewis said: "He thought it was chocolate on my face and so when I lost my lips he refused to go near me.
"He could get his head around the legs and the arm, but then last Saturday he came the closest he's come to me since it happened.
"I put my arm stump out and touched him and I said, ‘Look at that’ and he said, ‘No, get off'.
"But then I flexed my bicep even though it was agony and he just fell about laughing, he absolutely loved it."
The keen golfer is focusing on the future, including competing in amputee competitions and walking his labrador Holly again.
Mr Lewis said: "It's a huge game changer.
"My life will never be the same again, our family life will never be the same again but I feel lucky.
"I'm lucky to be alive today.
"To be able to have the chance to walk the dog with my son again in the countryside, something as simple as that, just like I used to. that's amazing.
"I think you realise how precious life is. It sounds corny but it's so true."
Serious invasive strep A infections are rare, with only an estimated one in every 33,000 people developing it a year in England.
It is usually treated with injections of antibiotics for seven to 10 days. In some cases, surgery may be needed to remove or repair damaged tissue.
Around one in four people who develop an invasive strep A infection will die from it.
http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/uk-news/pictured-flesh-eating-bacteria-victim-loses-3244704#ixzz2w3qiQmvg
No comments:
Post a Comment