“I work as hard as 10 people would”: story of soldier who started walking again after 3 strokes and respiratory failure

Heorhii Raskalei, a 22-year-old soldier from Kyiv Oblast, suffered three strokes and respiratory failure after being wounded near Bakhmut, where he also lost his right arm. First Medical Association of Lviv shares Heorhii's story. Heorhii was born in Irpin, Kyiv Oblast.

He joined the army when he was 19. He was already on the Donetsk front when Russia launched its full-scale invasion of Ukraine on 24 February 2022.

Heorhii Raskalei, 22, suffered three strokes and respiratory failure and lost his right arm Heorhii recalls a phone call from his mother, who was living in Irpin; she asked him: "Son, what am I supposed to do?

There's a tank right outside our house." Heorhii's sister and two younger brothers also lived in Irpin; the youngest was only three at the time. They were able to escape the city alive.

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Heorhii continued serving in the military but sustained severe wounds near Bakhmut in May 2023.

Heorhii was able to walk without any support just two weeks after embarking on rehabilitation A Russian mortar bomb struck the dugout where he was hiding. Pieces of shrapnel cut his body all over, and he suffered three brain haemorrhages.

Heorhii's brothers in arms gave him first aid; he was then transferred to a stabilisation centre at a hospital in Dnipro, where he suffered respiratory failure. Doctors had to amputate Heorhii's right arm, which was severely damaged by shrapnel. Heorhii's mum came to visit him in Dnipro.

She has remained by his side ever since. By the time Heorhii regained consciousness, he had been transferred to a hospital in Kyiv, still in critical condition. Doctors were not very hopeful he would ever fully recover: at the time, he couldn't sit up for more than a few seconds, and walking was entirely out of the question.

"Doctors told me: whatever I can accomplish in six months is what I'll have for the rest of my life," Heorhii says

Heorhii was transferred to the Nezlamni (Invincible) National Rehabilitation Centre in Lviv, where surgeons, neurosurgeons and rehabilitation experts all worked with him. "The patient's condition was critical when we received him. Heorhii needed help to move and [take care of himself].

He also needed help sleeping and dealing with other physiological processes," says Andrii Androsh, Heorhii's doctor. Heorhii took his first steps on his own just two weeks after embarking on his rehabilitation course. His doctor says that Heorhii will soon be fitted with a prosthesis, which will enable him to return to normal life.

Heorhii's doctor says that Heorhii will soon be fitted with a prosthesis, which will enable him to return to normal life

"My training starts at eight in the morning and ends at four in the afternoon. Doctors told me: whatever I can accomplish in six months is what I'll have for the rest of my life. The brain's neuroplasticity will then start to diminish.

So I have to work as hard as 10 people would," Heorhii says.

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