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Miracle Boy Survives Metal Hook Through Brain
An X-ray shows a metal rod lodged in the brain of Jessiah Jackson, 17 months. The boy has been released from UNC Hospitals and has fully recovered. [UNC Hospital]
The Baltimore Sun via YellowBrix
July 29, 2010
CHAPEL HILL, N.C. — A North Carolina family is thankful for their 17-month-old son’s life after a gruesome household injury.
Jessiah Jackson is free of any apparent brain damage after a neurosurgeon removed a metal part lodged two inches into the back of the boy’s brain.
According to the boy’s grandfather, the toddler was standing on a chair outside their home in Wilmington when the chair toppled, throwing him backward onto an L-shaped part from a pressure washer.
“It was that bad. Nobody thought he was going to make it, "said Joseph Jones, the boy’s grandfather.
Emergency crews chemically paralyzed the toddler and airlifted him to University of North Carolina Hospitals in Chapel Hill, where a neurosurgeon removed the metal after two hours of surgery.
Jessiah Jackson
Examinations haven’t found evidence of long-term damage. The toddler has a small bump on his head from the surgery.
Doctors say the boy’s recovery is amazing given that the metal rod missed critical blood vessels by less than an inch.
“It didn’t do damage on the way in, and I had to make sure I didn’t damage it on the way out. If that was the case, then this patient could have suffered instant death or a massive stroke,” said Anand V. Germanwala, M.D. of UNC Hospitals.
The toddler is scheduled to be sent home on Tuesday. He will remain on antibiotics for three weeks.
