From: Angie's Medical Report

ASSESSMENT:

1. Motor vehicle crash
2. Post trauma respiratory failure, severe left pulmonary contusion.
3. Mildly displaced left lateral mass fracture of C2, fracture extending into left foramen.
4. Transverse and moderately displaced fracture of the lateral C7 transverse process.
5. Large right scalp hematoma.
6. Contusion of the right posterior temporal lobe, and small anterior subarachnoid hemmorage.
7. High right parietal image.
8. Small right pneumothorax.
9. Comminuted fracture of the left proximal humerus, open.
10. Small laceration of the spleen.
11. Fracture of the left inferior pubic rami.
12. Fracture of the left sacrum
13. Fracture of the right pubis
14. Small anterior hemorrhage, anterior to bladder.

On this page I'm going to try to put what happened to Angie into something you and I can actually understand, without getting a migraine trying to figure it all out.

There is a lot of information in the list of medical jargon at the right, but you need a medical degree to really understand what it all means. You almost have to read between the lines. It is my hope to put it into perspective.

I must warn you, there will be some dry humor involved. If you feel that isn't appropriate, oh well! You don't have to read it. There have been many good times in my life when I laughed till I cried. Lately all I've done is cry. Maybe I can reverse the process and cry til I laugh. There will be tragic stuff too, but maybe there will be some balance, some yen and yang.

I'm not trying to make fun if what happened to Angie, I would never do that. I love her more than air, and I'm kinda partial to taking my next breath. She is still in very serious condition. However she is alive and at least that is something we can work with. Angie is an amazing young woman. They would have been throwing dirt in my face, had it been me.

Lets go back a little ways to before Angie moved to Iowa. Not too far back, just a few months. We cannot live in the past, but we have to start somewhere.

This is Beary. He and I were so happy to see Angie after such a long time apart. I got Beary 8 years ago for Angie and he finally got to meet her in February of 2008.

Angie moved away to Iowa in March 2008, to live with her mom. She took Beary with her and left me all alone and sad here in California. I still remember the last thing she said to me before she got on the bus.; "Dad, don't look back, and don't cry.", I did both.

I moved back to California to try and keep Angie from... Never mind. That is another story, for another time...

Now let's fast forward to June 8th 2008. Angie is looking forward to starting her new job in the morning, and has driven to Ottumwa to get some clothes to wear for her first day on the job.

The weather looks pretty bad, but I think I can make it home if I hurry? That's sure a funny looking cloud? Let's go check it out! Looks like it's coming right out of the ground? (Let's go look closer?)

Angie left Ottumwa thinking she could beat the storm home. What was she thinking? (She's a blond, who can even guess?)

Well... Living in California most of your life, you don't worry much about a little storm. Mostly, you worry about Sun burn and the ground shaking, opening up, and swollowing you.

If you look at the medical report, under ASSESSMENT:, #1 says; "Motor vehicle crash". That is about the only thing in this report that was written in english!

Yep! It's wrecked alright?! (Duh?)

From the report we see it rolled over. It rolled over and over and over and... You can't see from these little bitty pictures very well, but the drivers side tires are gone and the brake rotors are sheared in half, like someone took a cutting torch to them.

Can you imagine, Angie was sitting behind the wheel of this truck, getting slammed around like a rag doll. I ache all over just thinking about it. Kinda like being in the mosh pit at a heavy metal concert.

The steering wheel is broken to pieces in the middle. Angie's chest did that. OUCH!!!

Angie is no dummy. She is a smart woman, very clever most of the time (for a blond). This could have happened to anyone. She just happened to be in the wrong place at the wrong time.

She learned what it feels like to be a crash dummy this day. Not many of us humans can go through this severe an accident and live to tell about it. (Hey! That was fun! Can I do it Again?)

She isn't made of plastic and steel. She found out she isn't invincible either. When your chest hits the steering wheel, and your head hits the windshield and you bounce around inside a car rolling sideways at 50 mph down the road, you realize just how fragile you really are.

Let's break the medical report down starting with #2 and #8:

"Post trauma respiratory failure, severe left pulmonary contusion. Small right pneumothorax" (Collapsed Lung).

In plain english, Angie quit breathing because her left lung was full of blood, and her right lung collapsed.

Contusion is the medical term for bruise. A bruise is caused when blood vessels are damaged or broken as the result of hitting some part of your body pretty hard. A bruise results from blood leaking from these injured blood vessels into the tissues as well as from the body's response to the injury.

Angie hit the steering wheel hard, probably many times. And probably the drivers side door too. (maybe the passeneger side door even? And the roof...) And who knows what else? Her right lung collapsed. Probably from a rib poking into it.

#3: Mildly displaced left lateral mass fracture of C2, fracture extending into left foramen.

Angie broke her neck! A fracture to the C2 cervical spine is called the "Hangmans Fracture", because that is where the hangman wants a condemned persons neck to break when they hang em. Usually, death is instantaneous.

Luckily for Angie, her C2 was only mildly displaced. You know, it makes me wonder just how far the spinal column or spinal nerve itself will actually stretch? I mean come on now, it can't be all that far, before it snaps apart like wet spaghetti?

The foramen is the opening between vertebrae through which nerves leave the spine. A fracture there is life threatening. Cut the nerve and it's adios muchacha, or at least you're paralyzed for life.

To make matters worse Angie didn't just fracture her C2, she also fractured her C7 or vertebra prominens, the last cervical vertebra. She broke her neck in two places!

Which brings us to #4: Transverse and moderately displaced fracture of the lateral C7 transverse process.

A transverse fracture is across the bone at a right angle to the long axis of the bone. The transverse process is a protrusion extending out from either side of a vertebral body. Each vertebra has a pair of transverse processes, one on either side. Spinal muscles attach to the transverse processes.

I didn't know Angie had broken her C7 until I read this report.

Moving on now to Angie's head injuries. She didn't just hit her forehead hard. She hit her head on the right side and on top hard too. ( Wanna bet she does't remember it?)

#5: Large right scalp hematoma., #6: Contusion of the right posterior temporal lobe, and small anterior subarachnoid hemmorage., and #7: High right parietal image.

Angie had damage to her frontal lobe, where she hit with her forehead. She had damage to her right temporal lobe which is on the side of her head. She also had damage to her parietal lobe on top of her head.

Even more frightening to me is the bleeding into her brain or subarachnoid hemmorage. A subarachnoid hemmorage is bleeding in the area between the brain and the thin tissues that cover the brain. Even a small amount of bleeding into that area can be life threatening.

#9: Comminuted fracture of the left proximal humerus, open.

The picture at left doesn't do this injury justice. I chose to use it because it shows a comminuted fracture which is a fracture in which bone is broken, splintered or crushed into a number of pieces.(Ouch!) ( I can hear Angie now. Damn I broke a nail!?)

The humerus is the large bone from the shoulder to the elbow. A proximal humerus fracture is a break that occurs near the shoulder joint. The shoulder joint is a ball-and-socket joint, with the ball being the top of the humerus bone. Fractures of this ball are considered proximal humerus fractures.

This picture is a better representation that shows all the muscles, tendons, and ligaments. Angie had many of these injured, and some had to be removed, because the window glass was shoved up into her armpit. It was infected, open and extremely painful. After the 1st surgery, the bones shifted and they again had to go back in and fix it.

This was, for Angie, one of the most painful injuries. It, along with her arm and the fact that nerves were damaged and stuff removed, has become the hardest for her to cope with. The physical therapy for this is both frustrating and painful. Some days she can make a fist, yet on others she can't. On some days she can open her hand all the way, on others she can't.

She may never regain full use of her left arm. She is trying so hard to at least get her hand to work right. This makes me want to just cry. Have you ever tried to tie you shoe with one hand? Angie is so independent minded that she can't stand to let others do for her. Oh honey, I'm so sorry, please be patient, it'll come in time. Just keep trying, don't give up.

Angie's arm was fractured in three places but I don't know why it isn't on the initial report. How do you overlook something like that? I know broken arms happen all the time, but when the bone is stickin out...

Maybe with everything else that was wrong with her, her arm wasn't as critical as the rest. I do know they had two Surgeons working on her at the same time the day after they put the halo on. One on the arm and the other on her shoulder. (How many Doctors does it take to screw in a light bulb?)

#10: Small laceration of the spleen.

At first we thought that Angie would have to have her Spleen removed. I'm still not sure if that happened. ( I doubt if she knows either?)

The human spleen is an organ that creates lymphocytes for the destruction and recycling of old red-blood cells. The spleen is also a blood reservoir. It supplies the body with blood in emergencies such as a bad cut. The spleen is also the location where white blood cells trap organisms. The spleen is shaped like a loose fist and is tucked under the left side of the diaphragm.

#11: Fracture of the left inferior pubic rami. and #13: Fracture of the right pubis.

The pubic rami is a group of four bones in the front of the pelvis (inferior and superior bones for both the left and right sides) What can I say? A picture is worth a thousand words.

#14: Fracture of the left sacrum.

The sacrum is a large, triangular bone at the base of the spine and at the upper and back part of the pelvic cavity, where it is inserted like a wedge between the two hip bones. Its upper part connects with the last lumbar vertebra, and bottom part with the coccyx (tail bone).

Just because Angie is out of the hospital does not mean she has recovered from these injuries (Duh?). She still has a long, long, way to go before that happens. Probably years! I hope she never remembers the brutal details of this accident. That, at least, is still missing from her memory.

She is making great progress for someone who has had so many injuries. I mean really? There are 14 lines listed on the report, but there are multiple injuries on almost every line, and they missed listing some, I've counted 22. This doesn't include the unseen, unknown, nerve damage. And what about the psychological impact?

If Angie said tomorrow: "Dad come here, I need you", I would quit my job and come running. That probably wouldn't be the wisest decision, as I am more help where I'm at. At least here I'm employed.

I'm not finished with this page. I just got so damned depressed doing it I have to quit for a while. See: A Father's Plea.