Firefighter expects to attend benefit

By TAYLOR BROWN

tbrown@yourmvi.com

Sound the alarm!

After nearly a month in the hospital, Monessen No. 1 firefighter Nate Lynch will be home in time to personally thank friends and family members during a benefit Sunday.

Nate, 19, was flown by emergency helicopter to Allegheny General Hospital in Pittsburgh Feb. 20 after he began experiencing numbness on his left side.

His mother, Rhonda, said Nate was at the fire station when the numbness and tingling began. He called to see if they would look him over, as both of his parents have medical experience. 

“We checked his grip strength, made him smile, everything seemed to be OK,” she said. 

At first, his mom thought he might be having an allergic reaction and suggested he get checked out, but he felt well enough and decided to go home to rest.

But Nate was unable to move to get out of his car once he got home and had to call his parents for help.

“By the time we got home, he had no grip strength, his face was drooping and he could not move his left leg,” his mother said. 

EMTs decided it would be best to fly him by medical helicopter to AGH for treatment.

By the time Rhonda and her husband Bill got to the hospital, Nate had been diagnosed with a bleed on his brain and was admitted to the intensive care unit.

The next day he underwent a procedure to relieve pressure on his brain.

He remained in intensive care for more than a week before being transferred to a stepdown unit and then to Jefferson Hospital for inpatient rehab.

He is expected to be discharged from the hospital today and is able to walk with the assistance of a cane.

While doctors still don’t know what caused the bleed on his brain, they suspect it may be an arteriovenous malformation. Also known as an AVM, it is usually present at birth and causes arteries and veins to rupture, resulting in bleeding into the brain or spinal cord.

Nate will receive another angiogram in two months, but he is on the road to recovery. 

“When he got here he couldn’t move at all, so he has come a really long way,” Rhonda said. “We know he has a long way to go, but he is on his way.

“The doctors think with time and hard work on his part, he should be able to make a full recovery.”

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