11 year old stroke patient

Whilst on placement one of my patients was an 11 year old who had a stroke! I have a niece who is a year older ad I teach kids that age swimming, which made me absolutely shocked that you can have a stroke at any age nowadays, especially with the increase in junk food and decrease in exercise. This child was fairly obese and it was so hard watching his parents and nanny give him “oxygen” (little sweets) to get him to do the exercise. Being a student from another country I did not feel I could try get the parents to stop this practice, especially since the physios didn’t seem to have been successful in doing it themselves, the child was too spoilt and although the parents spoke English the nanny did not. From talking with my supervisor about it I was told it was slowly being cut back as originally he was having at least 10 sweets a day, however due to the need to exercise and get as much recovery as possible they had not cut it out completely. I came up with games as bribes during my sessions rather than letting him have sweets, sometimes having half games half treatments to keep the child’s motivation up. Bribery is always the best motivator in children and I mentioned a few times to the mother that using computer game time would be a great motivator but unfortunately I don’t know if that will ever happen. By the end of the placement the child had recovered so quickly, he had improved balance and had started walking and his pain levels were also decreasing in his arm. It was quite upsetting seeing him like most kids forming an attachment to us then having to say goodbye but with his age he has a very good chance of making a better recovery and I can only hope that they can get on top of his diet and become firmer with him and his two siblings (both also overweight). I really hope this is the only child I will every have to treat for a stroke as it was heartbreaking to see the confusion and pain it caused this poor kid to have “fallen down”.