{"id":4788,"date":"2025-10-30T11:24:31","date_gmt":"2025-10-30T01:24:31","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/metronorth.health.qld.gov.au\/stars\/uncategorized\/wally-lewis-stars-rehab-patients"},"modified":"2025-11-05T05:35:30","modified_gmt":"2025-11-04T19:35:30","slug":"wally-lewis-stars-rehab-patients","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/metronorth.health.qld.gov.au\/stars\/news\/wally-lewis-stars-rehab-patients","title":{"rendered":"King Wally Lewis brings his love of rugby league to rehab patients at STARS"},"content":{"rendered":"

King Wally Lewis brings his love of rugby league to rehab patients at STARS<\/h1>\n
\"Wally

Wally Lewis visiting staff and patients at STARS rehabilitation gym, including patient Mark.<\/p><\/div>\n

This week sporting legend \u2018King\u2019 Wally Lewis brought his love for the game of rugby league to the patients and staff at the rehabilitation gym at the Surgical, Rehabilitation and Treatment Service (STARS).<\/h4>\n

Wally has seen his fair share of injuries during his rugby league career and also had a knee reconstruction last year, so he is very familiar with the rehabilitation journey.<\/p>\n

Patients at STARS are recovering from a range of health conditions including stroke, acquired brain injuries and trauma.
\nWally spent time chatting with patients about their rehab and reminiscing about his rugby league career. It seems everyone has a Wally Lewis story, from memories of watching him play in the State of Origin, meeting him when they were younger, to being inspired by his biography. Rugby league is indeed a universal language!<\/p>\n

Director of Physiotherapy Haylee Kajewski knows how rehabilitation can be physically and emotionally challenging and how meeting a football great face-to-face can really lifts spirits.<\/p>\n

\u201cWally\u2019s visit to STARS bought a smile to the faces of patients and staff alike,\u201d Haylee said.<\/p>\n

\u201cHis genuine care and warmth shone through, and it was wonderful to hear how Wally\u2019s career continues to be an inspiration to others to apply those values of grit, determination and resilience.\u201d<\/p>\n

For patient Mark, meeting Wally was a great addition to what had already been a very successful rehabilitation session, having performed his first stand from a chair. Mark, who is recovering from a car accident, spoke to Wally about how he approaches his rehabilitation.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou\u2019ve got to have a positive attitude,\u201d said Mark.<\/p>\n

\u201cI make the effort as I want to get home to my kids and grandkids. To be able to do that I have to do the work.\u201d<\/p>\n

RBWH Foundation CEO Simone Garske is thrilled the Foundation can make a small difference to a patient’s day.<\/p>\n

\u201cWally has been visiting regularly this year as part of our 40 Moments of Joy, the Foundation\u2019s gift to STARS and RBWH in celebration of our 40th anniversary,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

\u201cWatching the reaction of everyone Wally meets has been incredibly rewarding and I know that ‘The King\u2019 is as enthusiastic about the visits as are patients and staff!\u201d<\/p>\n

We thank Wally for giving his time so generously and to the RBWH Foundation for facilitating the visit.<\/p>\n<\/div><\/div><\/div><\/div><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Wally Lewis visiting staff and patients at STARS rehabilitation gym, including patient Mark.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":77,"featured_media":4789,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_searchwp_excluded":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4788","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/metronorth.health.qld.gov.au\/stars\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4788","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/metronorth.health.qld.gov.au\/stars\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/metronorth.health.qld.gov.au\/stars\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/metronorth.health.qld.gov.au\/stars\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/77"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/metronorth.health.qld.gov.au\/stars\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4788"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/metronorth.health.qld.gov.au\/stars\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4788\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4791,"href":"https:\/\/metronorth.health.qld.gov.au\/stars\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4788\/revisions\/4791"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/metronorth.health.qld.gov.au\/stars\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/4789"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/metronorth.health.qld.gov.au\/stars\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4788"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/metronorth.health.qld.gov.au\/stars\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4788"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/metronorth.health.qld.gov.au\/stars\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4788"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}