Two hours dead, baby fights back to life

A BABY girl came back to life two hours after she was pronounced dead after falling into a river in the UK.

The girl tumbled into the Thames with her mother and sister, three.

Ambulance officers and doctors in a hospital emergency room tried to restart her tiny heart but eventually gave up.

Then it suddenly began to show the faintest of beats.

The 10-month-old was taken into intensive care, where she was in a critical condition last night.

It is thought her body went into “suspension” when immersed in the cold water, slowing her circulation. Bodies can sometimes survive for many minutes underwater because of the cold and still be revived.

According to one rescuer, the mother said she had fainted while feeding the ducks with her children, although another witness said he believed a gust of wind had blown the little girl’s buggy into the water.

All three ended up in the river and swallowed mouthfuls of muddy water before being rescued by a boatman.

The baby was flown to hospital where, according to police, medics said she had drowned.

Her mother and sister, taken to hospital as a precautionary measure, were fine last night.

Last night a hospital spokesman said: “A full paediatric clinical team attempted to resuscitate the child in the emergency department.

“After a lengthy period of resuscitation, a unanimous decision was made by the clinical team to stop treatment, in the best interests of the child. Subsequently, the child showed very fragile signs of life.

“This does occasionally happen and the child was moved to the paediatric intensive care unit of the hospital. She remains in an extremely serious and critical condition.”

The drama unfolded on a leafy towpath near the Oxfordshire town of Goring, a few hundred yards downstream from the country home of pop singer George Michael.

The captain of a passing cabin cruiser spotted the three floundering in the deep water and immediately called police before leaping in to help.

He managed to get two of them out of the river before other rescuers joined the effort.

An official police statement announced the girl’s death shortly before midday.

But two hours later, on the towpath at 2pm, Sergeant Graham Pink said: “The child was pronounced dead at the John Radcliffe Hospital before a very faint heartbeat was discovered.

“The child remains in a critical condition.”

http://www.news.com.au/story/0,23599,23926543-38200,00.html

Boy, 10, Dies From ‘Secondary Drowning’ Hours After Swallowing Swimming Pool Water

I never heard of such a thing…

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GOOSE CREEK, S.C. – A 10-year-old South Carolina boy died last weekend several hours after he swallowed water in a swimming pool.

Goose Creek police say Johnny Jackson swallowed some water while swimming in a pool at his apartment complex around noon Sunday.

Police say he later complained he was tired and took a nap. When someone checked on him, water was coming out of his nose and he was having trouble breathing.

The boy later died at Trident Hospital.

Berkeley County Coroner Glenn Rhoad told the Charlestown Post and Courier of Charleston the boy’s lungs were filled with water and he died of asphyxiation.

Rhoad said there was nothing suspicious about the death.

The boy, a fourth-grader called “Jon-Jon” by his family, essentially drown, medical experts told the Post and Courier.

Not all drowning deaths happen immediately. Other phenomena, such as secondary drowning, can occur as much as 72 hours later and without any warning signs.

Dr. Nelson Rosen, director of the trauma center a Schneider Children’s Hospital on Long Island, said secondary drowning is scary because there is a latent period where the victim looks as though they are fine.

“Any choking episode could be concerning,” Rosen told FOXNews.com. “The only question is this: Everybody’s had a mouth full of water and choked, how do you know whether it will cause secondary drowning? I would say that if there is a significant episode to the point where people are concerned about the child’s well-being, then that should be investigated.”

Rosen said parents should be on the look out for symptoms of respiratory or breathing problems, coughing and a “raspy” voice, as these could be indicative of injury to the lungs.

Although secondary drowning is a concern, it amounts to only 5 percent of total drownings, Rosen said.

“These are episodes that are not unheard of by any meaning, but even regular drownings are a relatively rare event in modern society,” he said. “But I would still caution that any significant event be checked out in an emergency room. And if people now have a low threshold for these types of things, I would say that’s fine. Better to err on the side of caution.”

http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,362815,00.html

Surgeons: Man’s ‘Tumor’ Turned Out to Be 25-Year-Old Towel

Wednesday, June 04, 2008

Surgeons in Japan thought they were removing a tumor from a 49-year-old man who was suffering from abdominal pain in late May.

Instead, they found a 25-year-old surgical towel that had crumpled into what looked like a softball-shaped tumor, Agence France-Presse reported.

The patient apparently had been carrying the cloth since 1983, when surgeons left it in him after minor ulcer surgery.

He went to Asahi General Hospital in late May after suffering pain. Doctors, at the time, found what they believed to be an 8-centimeter tumor.

According to an Asahi General Hospital spokesman: “The towel was greenish-blue although we are not sure about its original color.”

http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,362815,00.html