Toyah Battersby’s (Georgia Taylor) fostering dream was put on hold in Coronation Street, as she received word from Leanne Tilsley (Jane Danson) that Oliver has an incurable form of mitochondrial disease.
Toyah and Imran (Charlie de Melo) were incredibly excited about the prospect of becoming foster parents.
They set up a meeting, and said meeting took place during tonight’s episode — and it appeared as if they stood a good chance at making their fostering dreams a reality.
What is mitochondrial disease?
Mitochondrial diseases result from failures of the mitochondria, specialized compartments present in every cell of the body (except red blood cells).
Mitochondria are responsible for creating more than 90% of the energy needed by the body to sustain life and support organ function. When they fail, less and less energy is generated within the cell. Cell injury and even cell death follow. If this process is repeated throughout the body, whole organ systems begin to fail.
The parts of the body, such as the heart, brain, muscles and lungs, requiring the greatest amounts of energy are the most affected.
Symptoms vary depending on the organ(s) affected but may include seizures, atypical cerebral palsy, autistic features, developmental problems, fainting and temperature instability.
According to The Lily Foundation, the prognosis depends upon the severity of the disease and other criteria. As more research funds are raised to find more effective treatments and ultimately a cure, some of the affected children and adults are living fairly normal lives with mitochondrial disease.
In other cases, children may not be able to see, hear, talk or walk. Affected children may not survive beyond their teenage years. Adult onset can result in drastic changes from an active lifestyle to a debilitating ilness is a short amount of time.
Treatment plans vary from patient to patient but involve therapies, diet changes and other means to try and slow the progress of the disease.
You can find out more information from the NHS here.
Meanwhile, at the hospital, Leanne and Steve (Simon Gregson) learned that Oliver did indeed have mitochondrial disease — and it’s an incurable form.
Leanne was devastated, but refused to believe what she’d heard — demanding a second opinion.
As word filtered out among the residents of the street, Toyah was heartbroken, and came to realise that she needed to be there for her sister.
Therefore, she informed Imran that they’d be unable to proceed with their fostering plan for the time being.
https://youtube.com/watch?v=d6RqFLyLB5w%3Fversion%3D3%26rel%3D1%26fs%3D1%26autohide%3D2%26showsearch%3D0%26showinfo%3D1%26iv_load_policy%3D1%26start%3D2%26wmode%3Dtransparent
Naturally, Imran was upset, as was Toyah.
They asked Alya (Sair Khan), Ryan (Ryan Preston) and Craig (Colson Smith) to keep their fostering plans a secret for the time being.
Will Toyah reconsider?
Coronation Street continues Wednesday 1 July at 7:30pm on ITV.
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