It’s not every day you see a man lying against the side of a van in the middle of rural Ireland. Particularly not a fit and healthy 39-year-old rugby player.
Dave Brennan is a non-drinker and non-smoker. He was, and still is, a bon vivant who loves the game of cards, who enjoyed a promising junior rugby career with Ballinrobe and Claremorris Colts – he even played U-20 AIL for Connemara for a season.
The big, burly Ballyglass carpenter was going about his day’s work one Friday evening and felt a pain in his chest.
He got out of his van, composed himself, and drove off. He pulled in again and leaned up against the van – the same thing over again, about four or five times.
Then his neighbour, Sarah Keane, who is trained in first aid, came upon him while passing.
Had she not spotted Dave that October evening, he would not be alive today.
“The right person came on him. She knew what was wrong straight away because he wasn’t able to move his right side or he wasn’t speaking,” Dave’s sister, Caroline, tells The Mayo News.
“So she called the ambulance straight away and in fairness, the response time was really good. The ambulance, once they came, they knew it was a stroke, so then it was straight to Castlebar for a scan.”
His stroke was caused by a heretofore undiagnosed case of atrial fibrillation in his heart.
The doctors ordered that he be sent straight to the country’s leading stroke unit in Beaumont Hospital.
Time was against him and ambulances were clogged, so he was transferred east by helicopter.
“We couldn’t wait any longer. The more time that passes the more damage that’s done,” Caroline explains.
The church in Mayo Abbey couldn’t hold the crowd that flocked the following Friday evening to pray for the local lad who was fighting for his life up in Dublin.
That Saturday night was ‘the scariest night’ of all for the Brennans. Time was not on Dave’s side, nor was his age.
“When a stroke happens, the brain can swell. If that happens in an older person, because their brain is already shrinking with aging, that’s not as serious,” Caroline explains, “but in a young person there’s no capacity in your skull for the brain to swell.”
At that point, Dave had had a clot removed from his groin while still conscious and was in intensive care.
“There were no guarantees that he’d regain any function or independence. It’s an absolute miracle, the recovery that he’s made.”
The Brennans are far enough down the road that they can look back and laugh.
And they do, frequently, over an hour-long cup of tea with The Mayo News at their family kitchen table in Ballyglass, where Dave looks as healthy as a trout. You’d barely even notice the lump they took out of his skull during one operation. His speech is laboured but improving all the time. His handshake is firm, his walk is straight and his arms are still like tree trunks – a very far cry from the early days of his year-long recovery.
“I wasn’t able to talk. ‘F**k’ was all I could say and that was it,” Dave tells The Mayo News.
After he stabilised, he was sent from Beaumont back to Mayo University Hospital, where he spent ten days waiting for an echo scan that only took half an hour. That gave him the all-clear to move across town to the Sacred Heart Home.
“I remember visiting him on one of the first evenings and I was like ‘He’s going to check himself out of here’,” smiles Caroline.
“It’s a big change. It’s obviously an older population, an older building, but once he got started with the rehab he really tore into it.”
Rehab in the Sacred Heart Home meant two daily speech and language and two daily physio sessions during those vital early days. Were he in the community, he may only have gotten one or two sessions a week.
“I think the Sacred Heart doesn’t really get enough credit,” says Caroline, who works as a physiotherapist.
“People think the Sacred Heart is the county home, an old folks home. But the St Joseph’s Rehab Unit, it’s as good as anything in the country. We’re so lucky in Mayo to have it because there’s lots of other counties that don’t have a unit like that.”
Despite being classed as ‘high priority’ due to his age, Dave wasn’t moved to the National Rehabilitation Hospital in Dun Laoghaire until May.
Throughout it all, he carried his good humour and determination the same way he carried a rugby ball through a heaving mass of muscle.
“The main thing that Dave recovered so well is his attitude,” says Caroline.
“In the Sacred Heart, I was like ‘This is so depressing, it’s not going to last.’ He just applied himself, never complained, never once felt sorry for himself, and always interacted with the staff.
“We had a family meeting in Dun Laoghaire and the ward manager said, ‘We will be so sorry to see Dave go because he just brings everyone together. Any new person that comes onto the ward, Dave goes over, finds out what their story is, gets them involved.’ She said he was a model patient. The best parent-teacher meeting Mam was ever at.”
Atrial fibrillation – or ‘a-fib’ – can affect anyone and potentially be fatal. It can be caused by lifestyle, but in David Brennan’s case, it was genetic, and it caused him to have a stroke. His was not exacerbated by booze, cigarettes or Covid-19 vaccines – none of which ever entered his system.
It can go undetected and asymptomatic for years. But thanks to cardiac screenings promoted by athletes like Mayo footballer Saoirse Lally, more cases are being detected and more lives are being saved.
All going well, Dave will make a full recovery and might even make it back onto the rugby field one day. He would encourage those with any heart problems in their family history to get it checked out.
“If Dave knew he had it,” says Caroline, “it would be managed and he never would have had a stroke.” In a country where 15 percent of strokes occur in people under 65, his story is well worth heeding.
You can find out more about stroke by contacting Croí 091 544310, emailing [email protected] or at www.croi.ie.
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