Luke's FES bike

Luke was involved in a road traffic accident 18 months ago resulting in a serious traumatic brain injury which has left him still in a minimally conscious state with no means of communicating with us. He is an amazing young man who loved life and seems determind now not to give in, so neither will we. Luke is unable to move his body himself and we are trying to find ways to move it for him, such that , hopefully, the brain will start to recognise these movements and start to do them itself. Because Luke doesn't move he runs the risk of all sorts of infections and breathing problems and limb spasticity. One thing we have noticed recently is the pooling of the blood in his feet due to the lack of blood flow back up to his heart caused by the lack of movement and pressure on his feet.  We are hoping to raise funds for this Functional Electrical Stimulation Bike (www.restorative-therapies.com, RT300) so that Luke can cycle daily to give him all the health benefits that a daily cycle would bring to all of us, but for him, it is so much more important just for his very being. The photograph above shows Luke having a demonstration of such a bike, a demonstration I was pretty sure Luke would not be able to participate in due to the issues linked to his lack of movement, but I was truly amazed; he cycled, aided by the stimulation, for 3 miles and appeared to really enjoy both the challenge and the sense of achievement; this made me realise that he needs something like this as he has the motivation to try and achieve more. The benefit of the electrical stimulation over a passive bike is that the muscles are receiving the correct messages to perform the cycle motion, thus they are actually being triggered and used to cycle, greatly improving Lukes circulation and hopefully also triggering different areas of Lukes brain into learning once more through repetition. Everyone both friends, family and strangers have been so amazingly generous so far in helping Luke, but so many keep asking if they can do more, so here is our next goal and we will be forever grateful and humbled by all donations. Thank you. Luke's family x