Patrick Mutegi is a young man who worked as a porter carrying luggage up Mount Kenya for mountaineers. He worked regularly on those incredible expeditions with Dave Harries, his son, Jonah as well as Jonah’s friends. Since Dave passed away, Dave’s partner, Linda Camm has remained in touch with Patrick.
Linda was called by Patrick on the morning of the 10th August to say that he had been involved in a grizzly car accident and that the car had rolled onto him and he was in a bad way. He had been transported from his home town, Chogoria, to the Kenyatta National Hospital where he lay for about 4 days before Linda became aware of what had happened.
Linda immediately went to the Kenyatta Hospital to get him transferred to the Coptic Mission Hospital, in Nairobi, where there are skilled surgeons and the facilities to deal with a spinal injury. He was operated on immediately by a brilliant surgeon, Mr. Awori.
Very fortunately for Patrick, the spinal cord was not damaged, but the surrounding sheath was very damaged by the vertebrae which had twisted and slipped on to the spinal column and as a result he has no movement from the waist down. Although the surgery went as well as one could expect, he no doubt will have a long and costly rehabilitation.
Linda has arranged a wheel chair for Patrick and has assisted him to get back home to Chogoria to be with his family and start his long road to recovery. Linda is in contact with Dr. Awori to find a very good physiotherapist to work on him while he is at home.
We are appealing to old friends, past pupils and well wishers who may have experienced one of Dave and Patrick’s amazing trips up Mt. Kenya. His medical bill is an extortionate 800,000 Kenyan shillings and well above anything he or his family can afford; therefore any little bit will be enormously appreciated. Patrick was a dedicated and knowledgeable mountaineer; wishing Patrick the strength to overcome the many hurdles ahead.