Viviana Brito

One of the achievements he has made in the year he has been using TrainFES functional electrostimulation is to stop relying on an orthosis. Below, find out what his progress has been like and his experience with the change to remote rehabilitation. 

 

Viviana Brito had a stroke almost 10 years ago. About a year ago, one of her friends read about TrainFES and sent her the link to see if it was useful for her particular case. As Viviana has always put all her energies into rehabilitation, she immediately got in touch and started the programme. Before buying it, she tried it for a while. I went to a rehabilitation centre that had the equipment and she did 5 sessions. There she could see that it really worked.

She is one of the patients who experienced a change in the way she was rehabilitated with the TrainFES system; at first the treatment was face-to-face and then, with the spread of Covid-19, she had to continue through the remote modality. And despite the fact that being confined made it a little complicated to perform some exercises in which she needed the assistance of a person to position the electrodes, it has been the only way she has been able to continue working for her improvement and not expose herself to contagion. Therefore, the training has been adapted to his current needs; the exercises are simpler. In each online session, she can review the questions and see what she can do for herself at home.

The stroke he suffered affected his left side, which is why the foot on that side was, as he explains, "crooked, bent, with a lot of load on the outside". This caused him a lot of discomfort in his little toe, so he had to start using an orthosis. This device allowed him to straighten his foot and step properly. But it was with the TrainFES treatment that he was able to walk better.

Regarding the effectiveness of the programme in his case, he says: "I didn't walk or I walked very badly, with a cane and a crooked foot. Now I am much better. In a couple of months I started to see significant changes with the use of TrainFES".

However, he stresses that the main thing about this treatment is perseverance. "If you really want to succeed, TrainFES is a contribution to all the rehabilitation you will need. You have to continue with kinesiology and the treatments. TrainFES is a good complement," he adds.

"Now I am much better. In a couple of months I started to see significant changes with the use of TrainFES".

Viviana has noticed that if she stops training for a while, she loses the progress she has made and then finds it difficult to get back on track. She realised this during this quarantine period when she suffered from plantar fasciitis (pain in the sole of the foot). "This was supposedly due to overuse. Before the pandemic, the person who helps me to do everything could come. I was just concentrating on my exercises.

But since April I do all the housework: cleaning, cooking, being on the move, it was a lot because I wasn't used to it. So I was told to rest and not to push myself any more. I was almost three weeks without doing the exercises, doing the minimum. I even had to start using the wheelchair in the flat because it was impossible to walk because of the pain. That's when I realised that because of those three weeks of rest, the difference was noticeable; my foot became sore again. Now I'm concentrating on getting my foot back to the way it was. I started using TrainFES again to straighten it out.