Entrepreneur's life-changing Dragon's Den pitch

Simon Sansome pitched his disability app on Dragon's Den

An entrepreneur who secured backing from all five dragons on Dragon's Den has said he has been "humbled" by people's response to his disability app.

After a life-changing injury left him paralysed, Simon Sansome from Leicestershire created an app called Snowball Community to help disabled people find and review restaurants, shops and attractions for their accessibility.

He secured £80,000 backing from the dragons and said keeping his television appearance a secret for 18 months since it was filmed "has been absolutely killing me".

Mr Sansome added he has not yet been able to enter a formal arrangement with the dragons, but has already received great help with PR and from their consultants.

Sara Davies snapped a selfie with Simon and the Dragons following the pitch

Mr Sansome slipped a disc while playing rugby in 2014 but a chiropractor "crushed his spine" which led to Cauda Equina Syndrome - a rare condition where the nerves at the bottom of his spinal cord are compressed.

He said he was then misdiagnosed and should have had an operation within 48 hours, but did not, which left him paralysed from the waist down.

After months in hospital and a year in recovery, Mr Sansome and his wife went to their favourite restaurant in Leicester and he noticed how "inaccessible the restaurant was".

He said: "I couldn't get through the door, I ended up urinating in the restaurant because the toilet was upstairs and I couldn't get to it."

Simon was overwhelmed but also excited by the dragons' offers

As a result, Mr Sansome set up a Facebook page called Ability Access in 2016.

He said: "I did that just to raise awareness of disabled access in Leicester. That's all I wanted to do.

"There wasn't any grand scheme behind it, it was just about raising the level of discussion."

But after more and more people liked the page and it grew, it led him to the idea of creating the Snowball Community app.

'Absolutely fantastic'

When the app was pitched on Dragons' Den, the dragons said they saw its potential and how it could potentially be incorporated into other services provided by companies like Google.

Mr Sansome said: "I had offers from five dragons which has only happened a few times in 22 years of Dragons' Den.

"The filming took place a year-and-a-half ago and keeping it a secret for so long has been absolutely killing me.

"Sara Davies' team have been absolutely fantastic helping with account PR and he has found the business consultants very helpful.

"We had tens of thousands of downloads in the first 24 hours after the show went out.

"But it has also been a humbling experience as we have had emails saying 'thank you so much for creating the app. I have got a stoma bag and need to go to the toilet on a regular basis and this is going to really change my life.'

"The idea now is to expand it. We have been working with Transport for London to make accessible tube map and we want to put a live feed in there for people going round London - and we want to do our own chatbot as well."