Lee Johnston on “slow road to recovery”; crash left him in critical condition
Johnston was involved in an accident at the North West 200 and was airlifted to hospital but his status, at the time, was announced as “non-critical”.
However, this was wrong. His family have confirmed he was kept alive en route to the hospital by the medical professionals who travelled with him, and he was in a critical condition upon arrival.
An update on Tuesday from Johnston’s family read: “Sorry nothing has been released up until this moment.
“As people are aware, Lee crashed Thursday in the super-sport practice. He was airlifted to Belfast hospital in a critical condition after having a blood transfusion on the golf course.
“It’s been a rollercoaster of a week, with Lee being in intensive care since Thursday, three days on a ventilator, 8 hours in surgery.
“We are pleased to announce - after suffering a broken femur, shoulder, break in the foot and face, a number of broken ribs and a collapsed lung, Lee is on the slow road to recovery.
“Lee was in a critical condition when he arrived at the Hospital, family and team were not informed of how bad of a condition he was in until the hospital staff explained the condition he was in on arrival. With this we weren’t aware of what had been released to the public.
“We would like to say a huge thank you to every member of staff that has worked on lee. From surgeons, doctors, nurses, we are very grateful for the treatment and care he has received.
“A huge thank you to the medical team that worked with Lee to keep him alive on the way to the hospital.
“The amount of support from people has been incredible and none of it has been unnoticed.
The support towards Lee, Christie, mum, sister and the team has been incredible.
“It’s going to be a slow and hard recovery but he will be back better than ever.
“He’s got a long journey ahead of him, we would be grateful if you could respect his privacy while he’s recovering.
“Thank you again for every single person that’s supported the past week.
“He will be back.”
James was a sports journalist at Sky Sports for a decade covering everything from American sports, to football, to F1.
