Totti visits the girl who comes out of the coma with her voice – Il Tempo

Promise kept. Francesco Totti calmly arrived at the entrance of the CEMI of the A. Gemelli IRCCS University Hospital with a single objective: to fulfill the promise he made to Ilenia Matilli, the nineteen-year-old victim last December of a very serious traffic accident that cost his life. best friend and interned for months in the High Intensity Neurorehabilitation Unit of the Polyclinic.

Thanks to the innovative treatments carried out by the Gemelli neurorehabilitation team led by Luca Padua, director of the School of Specialization in Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation of the Catholic University, Rome campus, the young woman woke up from a coma. An important role in this awakening was played by her idol, Roma captain Francesco Totti, who sent her a video message at the invitation of Ilenia’s parents. Ilenia, upon hearing his voice, had given comforting signs of recovery and asked, with the help of a blackboard that for the moment helps her to “express herself” by writing the sentences with her fingers, to meet him in the living room.

For about an hour Totti chatted with Ilenia, dressed in a yellow and red suit, talking and joking. An invitation to dinner followed when Ilenia can return home. Neuropsychologist Giulia Fredda, her guardian angel in the daily therapies provided by the innovative “immersive multisensory quarry” of the department of high intensity neurorehabilitation, helped Ilenia write on the board. «Emotions – explained Luca Padua – are the best connections. At Ilenia, we have implemented a precise protocol that provides for the synergy between pharmacotherapy and sensory paradigms. Ilenia was literally bombarded with visual, auditory and olfactory sensations in the so-called “immersive multisensory quarry”, which from time to time was transformed and filled with sounds, music and images on all the walls ». “Now – Luca Padua concluded – the road is still long but we have confidence”. Before greeting Ilenia, very excited and smiling, her parents and the entire Gemelli department team, Francesco Totti signed the AS Roma shirt worn by the young patient with gold marker.

Saying goodbye to Gemelli Totti, accompanied by Dr. Giorgio Meneschincheri, medical director of the Polyclinic’s health department, he encouraged Ilenia: “I want to see you out of the hospital soon and get your life back.” The day after his birthday, the unforgettable Giallorossi champion thus achieved one of his most beautiful goals at Gemelli.