A 56-year-old Aberystwyth man has heaped praise on a team of doctors, nurses and therapists who spent over five weeks caring for him after he was struck down by coronavirus.

Fit and healthy property maintenance worker Martyn Groom has told how, in the space of just 90 minutes, he went from tucking into a bacon bap and a cup of tea to being bedbound with fever, lethargy, nausea and stiffness.

After top-quality care from a team of clinicians led by Bronglais Hospital consultants Dr Donogh McKeogh and Dr Lenka Raisova, Martyn gradually began to recover from Covid pneumonia – and is now “on the mend” back at home with his wife Cheryl, a clinical nurse specialist at Bronglais.

He said: “It was very quick. I went to work on 23 March with a couple of colleagues and I had a bacon bap for breakfast. We heard the news about a lockdown coming, so we decided to call it a day and went home.

“They dropped me back at home and I had a cup of tea – that was at around 10.30am – and by 11.30am I was in bed shaking, with a fever, feeling sick and lethargic. It literally came on like a light switch – that’s how quick it was. I hadn’t experienced a cough or any other symptoms up until the moment it hit me.”

Martyn added: “I was in bed at home for nine days prior to admission and was very ill.

"I went to A&E and was taken to the isolation unit, and then they transferred me to the Covid ward where I was swabbed for the virus.

"Despite having a temperature and cough I didn’t feel short of breath before I was admitted. I felt better after having intravenous fluids and oxygen but then, just as I was starting to feel a little bit better, the pneumonia progressed.”

Over the course of those five weeks Martyn was treated with Continuous Positive Airway Pressure (CPAP) – a form of non-invasive ventilation – but came close to being admitted to intensive care.

“I didn’t have to be ventilated although I was very close to it – they rang my wife and said they were probably going to need to take me to ICU at one point. I can’t speak highly enough of Dr McKeogh and Dr Raisova and their teams and the nursing staff, they were absolutely first class.

“I’m back home now and I can walk about 100 yards before I get out of breath. I am slowly getting better with the support of the dietitians and physiotherapists. Three weeks ago I was in a totally different place, needing assistance to even walk to and from the bathroom.”

Dr McKeogh, Covid-19 lead at Bronglais, added: “We learned a lot from treating Martyn. He was one of the first patients hospitalised locally with this disease, and he got very ill at one point. He is the first patient I have ever treated with prone CPAP and it worked well. We learned from that.

“I was grateful to work with someone so willing, with such a positive mind-set.”

Martyn, whose daughters, Hannah, 27, and Lucy, 26, also work in the NHS, added: “Covid-19 is a serious disease and while there isn’t a cure for it yet, there is always hope. I turned 56 in hospital – being able to go home to my family was the best gift I could ask for.”