Post by Erika on Feb 25, 2006 1:33:11 GMT -5
www.abcactionnews.com/stories/2006/02/060223spa.shtml
This is such an amazing thing he's really doing. I admire him very much!!
Thanks to 'Screech,' boy gets necessary therapy
an ABC Action News report 02/23/06
BELLEAIR - A severely disabled boy now has a new lease on life after receiving a very special gift from an unexpected donor.
Still not quite 5, little Keegan has survived periventricular heterotopia, a rare neural migrational disorder complicated by cerebral palsy. But he needed water therapy.
"Just the release of gravity, you know, they're just kind of in the water and he can just move around feeling weightless," explained the boy's mother, Laura Oursler.
"Hands will open up, where before they were kind of crinkled really tight. He gets really comforted and then he'll go to sleep quietly, which reduces his medication because normally without this, he would have to have medication to do that," spa specialist Germain Garcia added.
Keegan's plight came to the attention of Dustin Diamond, known to many as 'Screech' from the TV show 'Saved by the Bell.' He had his own personal reason to help.
"My wife and I lost our first child. And that was difficult because you're not prepared for that," Diamond explained.
So Diamond formed a children's foundation that, along with the Thermospas company, donated a therapeutic spa to the Ourslers. Now the family of six no longer has to all pile in the car for trips to therapy; the pool is right in the back yard.
If the family had to foot the bill for the spa, it would have cost $14,000. But they say the real value of the gift is the time they get to spend together as a family.
This is such an amazing thing he's really doing. I admire him very much!!
Thanks to 'Screech,' boy gets necessary therapy
an ABC Action News report 02/23/06
BELLEAIR - A severely disabled boy now has a new lease on life after receiving a very special gift from an unexpected donor.
Still not quite 5, little Keegan has survived periventricular heterotopia, a rare neural migrational disorder complicated by cerebral palsy. But he needed water therapy.
"Just the release of gravity, you know, they're just kind of in the water and he can just move around feeling weightless," explained the boy's mother, Laura Oursler.
"Hands will open up, where before they were kind of crinkled really tight. He gets really comforted and then he'll go to sleep quietly, which reduces his medication because normally without this, he would have to have medication to do that," spa specialist Germain Garcia added.
Keegan's plight came to the attention of Dustin Diamond, known to many as 'Screech' from the TV show 'Saved by the Bell.' He had his own personal reason to help.
"My wife and I lost our first child. And that was difficult because you're not prepared for that," Diamond explained.
So Diamond formed a children's foundation that, along with the Thermospas company, donated a therapeutic spa to the Ourslers. Now the family of six no longer has to all pile in the car for trips to therapy; the pool is right in the back yard.
If the family had to foot the bill for the spa, it would have cost $14,000. But they say the real value of the gift is the time they get to spend together as a family.
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