Swedish ice hockey hero with ALS: Unable to speak

Perhaps Sweden’s greatest ice hockey icon was diagnosed with ALS earlier this year. Now Börje Salming (71) can no longer speak and has to eat through a feeding tube.

NATIONAL TEAM HERO: Börje Salming played the World Cup for Sweden at home in 1989, 17 years after his World Cup debut in 1972.

– The disease relapsed very quickly, said his wife Pia Salming Express.

Swedish newspapers published a story Monday about the ice hockey defender who almost literally paved the way for other Europeans to enter the American and Canadian professional league NHL in the early 1970s. Salming played 17 seasons in the world’s best ice hockey league after moving from Brynäs in 1973.

16 for the Toronto Maple Leafs and one for the Detroit Red Wings.

A total of 1,148 games in the NHL regular season and 81 playoff games for the Stanley Cup.

Kiruna-born Salming ended his career aged 40 at his home in Sweden. He played three seasons for Stockholm club AIK from 1990 to 1993, alongside then-Norwegian national team captain Petter Salsten, among others.

LEGEND: Börje Salming played 16 seasons for the Toronto Maple Leafs from 1973.

He has also had success as a businessman with the help of the trademark “Salming” and as a participant in a Swedish reality TV series.

Now he is badly affected by the incurable disease ALS. He and those closest to him suspected something was wrong with his body last February. In March he canceled an exhibition match with an old national team legend, in July he was diagnosed with Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis – ALS for short.

In August he present as a spectator in the stands of the Munich Olympic Stadium where his daughter Bianca participates in the all-around for Sweden.

EC VIEWER: Börje Salming accompanies his daughter Bianca during EC athletics in Munich in August.

Two months later, the disease settled in his throat. Most of his food and nutrition intake was accomplished via a probe placed in Salming’s stomach, and a tube from him to the frame of the backpack.

He communicates by typing what he wants to “say” on the iPad. In no time he became much weaker physically. Always fit and slim before, Börje Salming managed to lose 10 kilograms in the last two months.

Measurements in his spinal fluid show very high values.

– It’s impossible to describe. Seeing your loved ones feel so bad and you can’t do anything about it. And frustrated. Time is short, Pia from Börje Salming told Expressen.

She and Salming’s children believe that Sweden’s health care system is falling short on the care she should receive, but does not receive because the rules depend, among other things, on the age of the person needing care.

Ken Robbins

"Bacon nerd. Future teen idol. Zombie aficionado. Troublemaker. Travel buff. Award-winning reader."

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