Brain-damaged girl surprises her doctors

Press, 14 March 1985, Page 33

Brain-damaged girl surprises her doctors

NZPA-APErie, Pennsylvania Shanda Baldwin, aged 11, a brain-damaged victim of carbon monoxide poisoning, shocked her doctors when she regained her speech at Christmas. Now, she has proved them wrong again — by walking, with the help of parallel bars. “She’s fooled them. They said they aren’t going to make any more predictions,” said Shanda’s grandfather, Mr Albert Warner. “She’s walking. It’s no miracle. But it was something we were very doubtful would happen,” said Dr Michael Plasha, spokesman for the Lake Erie Institute of rehabilitation. "We hope that she can walk by herself but that won’t come until we get the braces we’ve ordered,” Dr Plasha said. "When she came with us ... she had difficulty rolling on a mat without assistance.” Shanda’s speech and muscle control were blocked by brain damage when she, her aunt and two cousins were overcome by carbon monoxide on February 28, last year, in a snowbound car. Heather Farnham, aged six, and Tiffany, aged five died.

Their monther, Mrs Sandra Farnham, was released from a hospital the next day. Shanda lay in a coma for several weeks after the accident and entered the rehabilitation centre in July. Her mother, Mrs Linda Baldwin, aged 32, of Mayville, New York, said doctors told her that if Shanda lived, she was likely to be paralysed, mute and incoherent the rest of her life. But Shanda evoked joyful tears from her therapists and family shortly before Christmas when she erupted with “good morning,” “Merry Christmas,” and “I love you.” She surprised them again recently by taking her first steps between parallel bars, Dr Plasha said. “She’s a gutsy kid,” he said. “We had high doubts that she would be walking again.” Doctors have no certain explanation for Shanda’s recovery, which they described as the quickest they have seen. They suspect she may be recovering her faculties because her brain is still growing.