Gabrielle Giffords’ Shooting and Doctors’ Medical Description and Expectations
The Arizona Congress member was in some ways fortunate and others less so. The bullet entered her skull from the left side back of her head and exited from the front left. Her doctors in a Fox news conference indicated that she was fortunate in several ways: the bullet exited without pressuring the brain as would have occurred had it lodged within. It did not penetrate the center which would have been most likely fatal.
The downside is that it ran through the left side of the brain where speech and other intellectual functions are usually located. She has not spoken but indicated her awareness of questions by pressing the hand of a doctor.
She is now in a several day medically induced coma to protect the brain from more stress. The left side of her skull has been removed and stored to be replaced to reduce pressure. Bone chips have been removed. Relatively little brain substance was destroyed.
Her doctors seem moderately optimistic about the outcome if she lives.
Such grim details are hard to share, but are not rare in war of accidents of various kinds.
I am indebted to a Fox news doctors’ report. They had reported her death. Excellent care was provided from the moment she was shot by staff and then medical personnel who worked quickly with her.
Other wounded have moved the serious category at worst.
One hopes for the best for her. Most likely her stands in opposition to the planned Republican attack topics next week have delayed those. The noisy lady from Alaska had marked her along with 19 others as targets on a map.
I happened to get the medical details from a Fox News press conference — my first.
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“A war is just if there is no alternative, and the resort to arms is legitimate if they represent your last hope.” (Livy cited by Machiavelli)
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Ed Kent [blind copies]
7 users commented in " Gabrielle Giffords’ Shooting and Doctors’ Medical Description and Expectations "
Follow-up comment rss or Leave a TrackbackI pray this will be a lesson for all Americans. With freedom of speech comes the human obligation to use it responsibly. To “target” another human being for their beliefs shows the abuse our first amendment rights can deliver. As there are mad men around us who must take the responsibility of the evil they do, do those who incite them not also share in their guilt? Especially in a volatile time? The pen is shown once again to be mightier than the sword. How truly unfortunate. May god be with Gabrielle, all of the victims of this terrible tragedy and their families.
I hesitated to circulate such grim details, but I fear that the lack of such is turning killing into a fantasy world for too many Americans — drones or whatever which kill from on high. When I was a child I grew up in a moderate Republican home with guns — a BB gun, 22, 30-30 hunting rifle, revolver kept in my father’s safe which he said had been given to him by a policeman, shotgun. I became a crack shot until I was 12 or 13 and had just shot a small bird. Canney, the nurse who had inherited 3 kids orphaned by their parents who
died in an auto accident, asked me gently whether the bird might be a mother with babies now left uncared for in the nest. It made the point for me and I became a non killer, except for serious wars — was training in the NROTC until Ike ended the Korean war and I could resign.
NOTHING!!!!! she could have said while excersizing her freedom of speach warranted her death…! This is the act of a predator and unstable cold personality with multiple disorders and NO self discipline. STIR them up especialy in volatile times and it’s your fault? Did she speak improper or something and DESERVED this? That is twisted!!!! I am an AMERICAN, I will not accept that I should be silenced for fear of being shot and for you to say such a thing as this wounds my soul. Could you please elaborate on the “lesson” here because I am not quite sure I understand the “responsibility of mad men”. And NO those who incite them do NOT share in their guilt. (what did any poor baby ever do when it “incited” the sicko who killed them? This was an honorable and noble woman who was targeted by a SICKO Serial Killer!!
CORRECTION:speech
As they have said over and over again, she was shot in the left FRONT forehead and the exit wound was AT THE BACK of the head.
I was impressed with here care. They managed to remove part of her skull and remove ALL of the bone fragments, a great feat indeed.I wonder how much she comprehended of what was around her? I read that this type of entry and exit pattern could have done multiple things but I belive that she must have felt next to no pain and origional trauma was not instantanious but spread with pressure and tissue death, overall a clean comftorable way to go if there be a choice. I believe this is one of the reasons execution style shootings allowed for a question on a few occasions I read about in the Okanawa time period of 1940’s ww
You are WRONG! I watched the entire coverage on Fox and they never reported Gifford’s death. However, I specifically saw it reported on NPR’s website as I was watching Fox reporters say that others had reported the death while they were waiting confirmation.
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