The Dutch cyclist Amy Pieters wakes up from the coma in which she fell at the end of last December, after having suffered a heavy fall during a training session of the Netherlands national track team in the Alicante town of Calpe, announced this Thursday the Dutch women’s cycling team Team SD Worx.
The 30-year-old athlete “can communicate non-verbally a little” and “recognizes people, understands what is said and can perform more and more activities,” according to the statement. Doctors are still unable to make a diagnosis of the exact medical damage Pieters may have suffered from the brain injury.
The cyclist lost consciousness after suffering a blow during road training in the municipality of Calpe, in Alicante (Spain), which led to her being transferred to a hospital in Alicante by helicopter and undergoing emergency surgery on her head “to save her life”says the note. Given the severity of the injury sustained, Pieters, the national champion, was admitted to the ICU, and she has since lost consciousness due to the severe brain damage she sustained.
“Pieters spent a long period in a coma. On January 6, she was transferred from Spain to a hospital in the Netherlands,” the team confirms. Since mid-February, the young woman has been following an intensive specialized neurorehabilitation program at a Dutch institution. Pieters’ family has appreciated the “compassion” shown to the cyclist after the accident, but has asked that the privacy of those involved be respected.