Keisha | The Bubble Foundation
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Keisha

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Keisha age 17 (January 2026), from Flint in Wales, was diagnosed with a rare immune condition called T-cell deficiency in December 2023. Keisha was poorly when she was small, first catching chicken pox at age 3 which put her in hospital with pneumonia. She then had lots of ear, sinus and chest infections. As time went on she developed more issues but it took until April 2023 to get her diagnosis.

Keisha came to Ward 3 with her mum Laura in August 2023. The tests done as part the assessment process found that she had a problem with her lungs. Keisha explains “I’d been told I had asthma for the last ten years, we even went to our local hospital three months beforehand because I was struggling but they said it was just mild asthma and allergies.” But in fact, she was found to have a lung function of 47%, and was diagnosed with bronchiectasis, which is similar to cystic fibrosis. Devastatingly this not only meant that she was not well enough to have the bone marrow transplant; it also meant she needed urgent treatment. Laura explains: “Her lungs were just full of fluid, and it was full on panic stations from the doctors then, because she was not well enough to have a bone marrow transplant, but as they explained if she didn’t have a bone marrow transplant then everything's going to get worse. Her lungs were going to get worse, and she would keep getting infections.”

A week later Keisha was admitted for treatment, where further tests found that she had pneumococcal infections, which are caused by the Streptococcus pneumoniae bacteria, in her face and in the sinuses. They also discovered that she had Epstein-Barr virus as well. By this time it was early September, and she was incredibly poorly, and Laura recalls how a few doctors seemed shocked, explaining that they hadn’t realised how bad it was and that she should have been seen earlier. This confirmed to the family that the link between all of Keisha’s different issues had been missed for years between all the hospitals, with no one seeing the broader picture.

Eventually after intensive chemotherapy Keisha received her bone marrow transplant in January 2024. She spent 235 days in hospital, including Christmas and her 16th birthday and a month in isolation.

Unfortunately, Laura explains, “Keisha had lots of complications from both the transplant and from the chemo. She developed something called gastroparesis, which is basically where the stomach stops working. She was constantly vomiting, in chronic pain and suffering from constant fatigue. At her worst she couldn’t get out of bed for around six weeks, and slept most of the day, she barely ate and eventually needed to be fed via a TPN (TPN refers to total parenteral nutrition, which is an alternative way of providing a patient with nutrition when the gut does not work or is inaccessible).” So, instead of revising for her GCSEs, and planning her dress for prom Keisha found herself living hundreds of miles away from her family, friends and really her own life. This was incredibly hard on her, but she found comfort in music, in books, and in films.

Keisha has been home since the summer of 2024, but (January 2026) she still has a range of challenges to face, including coming to terms with her loss of mobility, which is due to axonal neuropathy, and the prospect of surgeries on her lower limbs to try to improve their function. She is still immunocompromised, having undergone the bone marrow transplant she will need to wait until she has recompleted all of the routine childhood immunisations before she will no longer be classed as being ‘at risk.’ But, beyond these challenges her overall prognosis is hopeful, as the bone marrow transplant was deemed a success. Laura explains that “for now she still has monthly blood tests so that they can monitor everything, and we're still in the early stages but the hope is that her T-cell deficiency is cured as she's now got healthy T-cells that are working.”

Keisha is looking forward to starting college in September. Until then, she spends her time immersed in books, films, and dreaming up her next adventures.