A woman from United Kingdom woke up in a hospital after suffering a serious health problem and discovered that spoke with a different accentaccording to his story. The case was made known through local media.
The protagonist of the story is Cathy Warrena young woman 29 years who lives in a town Englandaccording to information released by british news agency Kennedy News and Media.
In September 2024, Cathy traveled to Türkiye with friends to enjoy the holidays. She revealed that, during her stay abroad, suffered a stroke that caused serious complications.
The beginning of a nightmare
One day, the 27th of that month, Cathy began to manifest a severe headache. «It seemed as if it were a heat stroke because he had been sunbathing. I lay down in bed and my head hurt a lot. I thought it was just heat stroke,» the British citizen recalled in conversation with the same media.
After a while, the young woman got out of bed to go to dinner at her hotel restaurant with her traveling companions. At one point, while walking towards the place, he began to feel sudden dizziness. Then, in her words, his legs «they stopped working«.
«We had just taken some photos and were going to dinner when, suddenly, I couldn’t keep walking. I couldn’t move my legsso my friend laid me down in a chair and went to get help«he commented.
Then, according to her explanation, the hotel receptionist returned with a wheelchair and took her to her room. Some time later, due to severity of the situationthey decided call emergencies so that the will be transferred to a hospital.
Once she arrived at the medical center, Cathy had a battery of clinical studiesincluding a computed tomography. Following the examinations, the doctors confirmed that the patient had suffered a cerebrovascular accident (ACV) severe.
The young woman got the scare of her life during a vacation abroad. Photo: Cathy Warren/Via Kennedy News and Media.Some time later, the young woman, who was hospitalized, woke up on a hospital stretcher and faced a hard blow of reality: had paralyzed the left side of his body and spoke with an accent different from his own. In his case, his voice it sounded like his mother’soriginally from Thailandal speak in English.
«I used to have a British accent, but I woke up and my accent was different. My mom is from Thailand, so she has thai accent (NdR: when speaking English). I would say that my current accent looks like yours«he assured.
Regarding this noticeable change in her way of speaking, Cathy indicated that she was diagnosed with the foreign accent syndrome (FAS, Foreign Accent Syndrome).
What is foreign accent syndrome
«Foreign accent syndrome (FAS) is a rare and complex speech disordercharacterized by the sudden appearance of one foreign accentgenerally after suffering neurological events such as stroke, traumatic brain injuries or neurodegenerative diseases,» researchers reported in a study published in 2024 in the Belgian medical journal Acta Neurologica Belgica*.
For its part, the American academic medical center Cleveland Clinic defined the syndrome in a article published on your website as a «neurological condition that affects the ability to pronounce sounds correctly«.
The young woman suffered a severe stroke. Photo: Cathy Warren/Via Kennedy News and Media.«Although a person with FAS may appear to speak with a different accent, it is generally a change in the pronunciation of certain sounds,» the entity stated.
How your case continued
In relation to Cathy’s case, she was about a month hospitalized in a hospital in Türkiye. In October 2024, she was transferred to the United Kingdom, where she remained in a local medical facility for more than 60 days.
After her stay in the hospital in her country, the young woman underwent treatment therapy. three month rehabilitation to walk again.
«At first I needed the help of three people to walk; It was probably just five minutes a day for a month. I had to learn again to walk with different aids: first a tripod, then a crutch, and now I can do it independently. I would say that it took me about ten monthsuntil the summer of 2025, to reach the point where I could walk on my own,” he said.
On the other hand, regarding the change in his speech, he stated that the problem still persists. «I already finished speech therapy, but my voice is still different. The doctors do not promise that she will recover, it is very rare. I feel like I’ve lost part of my identity«he reflected.
Scientific work quote
Mavroudis, I., Petridis, F., Kazis, D., Ionescu, C., Petroaie, A.D., Romila, L., Kamal, F.Z., Ciobica, A., Morosan, G.C., Novac, B., Novac, O., & Iordache, A. (2025). Foreign Accent Syndrome: insights from Neuroimaging and Pathophysiological mechanisms. Acta neurologica Belgica, 125(1), 43–52. https://doi.org/10.1007/s13760-024-02690-y
