Docs say hard to predict brain damage in Giffords

Docs say hard to predict brain damage in Giffords
WASHINGTON (AP) - Doctors say they are optimistic about Rep. Gabrielle Giffords' odds. But it can take weeks to months to learn the level of Brain Damage she might suffer from the gunshot blast to the head on Saturday. Dr. Peter Rhee, a trauma surgeon in Tucson where she was shot, said the bullet traveled the length of the left side of the Arizona congresswoman's brain, from back to front. That offers a better outlook than if it had entered the brain's center or both sides of the brain. She is...

Docs say hard to predict brain damage in Giffords
WASHINGTON (AP) — Doctors say they are optimistic about Rep. Gabrielle Giffords’ odds. But it can take weeks to months to learn the level of Brain Damage she might suffer from the gunshot blast to the head on Saturday. Dr. Peter Rhee, a trauma surgeon in Tucson where she was shot, said the bullet traveled the length of the left side of the Arizona congresswoman’s brain, from back to front. That offers a better outlook than if it had entered the brain’s center or both side...

ABC's Bob Woodruff on Gabrielle Giffords and recovey from traumatic brain injury
In 2006, ABC News reporter Bob Woodruff was on the ground covering the war in Iraq when a Roadside Bomb detonated near the vehicle in which he was traveling. The shockwave drove rock and shrapnel into his helmet, literally rattling his brain inside his skull. Woodruff awoke more than a month later, only to begin a long road to recovery. His journey is one that is shared by an estimated 80,000 to 90,000 Americans each year who suffer traumatic brain injury, or TBI.It was a long road to recover...

Gabriele Giffords Condition Unchanged
Source: ABC News Doctors treating Rep. Gabrielle Giffords were "slightly more optimistic" today about the recovery of the Arizona congresswoman who was shot in the head this weekend. "We're not out of the woods yet," said Dr. G. Michael Lemole Jr., Giffords' neurosurgeon and chief of Neurosurgery at Arizona's University Medical Center. "At this phase in the game no change is good, and we have no change." A recent CAT Scan showed that the swelling in Giffords' brain has not increased, and he sai...

Docs say hard to predict Giffords' brain damage
Dr. G. Michael Lemole, Jr., left, speaks about the condition of U.S. Rep.... TUCSON, Ariz. (AP) - Recovering from a gunshot wound to the head depends on the bullet's path, and while doctors Sunday are optimistic about Rep. Gabrielle Giffords' odds, it can take weeks to months to tell the damage. Doctors say the bullet traveled the length of the left side of the Arizona congresswoman's brain, entering the back of the skull and exiting the front. Fortunately, it stayed on one side of her brain, ...

Russ Belville: Arizona Shooter Loughner Used Marijuana... So What?
As you may know by now, in a tragic act of insane violence, Arizona Rep. Gabby Giffords was targeted for Assassination, but survived the point-blank gunshot allegedly fired by Jared Lee Loughner, a 22-year-old man whose rambling Internet paranoia calls his sanity into question.  Loughner also allegedly fired into the crowd, killing a 9-year-old girl (born on 9/11/2001, incidentally), a federal Circuit Court judge, a Giffords Staffer, and three others, and wounding several more.  All of us at...

Brain condition may accompany brain injury
VIENNA, Va., Jan. 8 (UPI) -- About 80 percent of patients who suffer a brain injury experience symptoms of an additional neurologic condition -- pseudobulbar affect, a U.S. group says. Susan H. Connors, president and Chief Executive Officer of the Brain Injury Association of America, says pseudobulbar affect is thought to be caused by structural damage in the brain due to injury or disease. It causes involuntary and unpredictable outbursts of laughing or crying, often in socially inappropriate s...

Docs optimistic, but Giffords in for long recovery
(01-09) 14:54 PST Tucson, Ariz. (AP) -- Recovering from a gunshot wound to the head depends on the bullet's path, and while doctors Sunday are optimistic about Rep. Gabrielle Giffords' odds, it can take weeks to months to tell the damage. Doctors say the bullet traveled the length of the left side of the Arizona congresswoman's brain, entering the back of the skull and exiting the front. Fortunately, it stayed on one side of her brain, not hitting the so-called "eloquent areas" in the brain's ...

Giffords' brain benefits from benign route of bullet
TUCSON, Ariz (Reuters) - Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords suffered what her doctors on Sunday called a "devastating wound" to her brain in a point-blank shooting, but the bullet's relatively benign trajectory bodes well for her recovery. For doctors at the University Medical Center in Tucson, the fact that the bullet did not cross from one hemisphere to the other nor through the center of the brain was crucial to Giffords' brain "preservation" before her two-hour surgery on Saturday. "Because o...

Docs optimistic, but Giffords in for long recovery
Dr. G. Michael Lemole, Jr., left, speaks about the condition of U.S. Rep.... Dr. G. Michael Lemole, Jr., left, looks on as Dr. Peter Rhee talks about... Dr. G. Michael Lemole, Jr., left, speaks about the condition of U.S. Rep.... - TUCSON, Ariz. (AP) - Recovering from a gunshot wound to the head depends on the bullet's path, and while doctors are optimistic about Rep. Gabrielle Giffords' odds, it can take weeks to months to tell the damage. Doctors say the bullet traveled the length of the left...

What Riverdaughter said
There seem to be two major camps regarding this tragedy: Sarah Palin is a monster and the Tea Partiers must be blamed. Or, Sarah Palin is the scapegoat and her picture had nothing to do with this tragic incident. I prefer the third way. .... In the past 18 years, starting with the advent of Rush Limbaugh, we saw a ratcheting up of Right Wing Extremism. ... And it is into this environment that Sarah Palin steps as the champion of a new set of people. A group that even the Right Wing Republicans ...

Barbara Walters Feels Sorry For Palin
During a View discussion on the Giffords shooting, Barbara Walters said that she feels sorry for Sarah Palin, who she feels is being unfairly singled-out in the wake of the Arizona shooting. All four members of the panel had strongly denounced Palin's crosshairs map when it was first published. Labels: Barbara Walters, Elizabeth Hasselbeck, Gabrielle Giffords, The View, Whoopi Goldberg New! Share this on Facebook: Share ...

Bullet didn't cross Giffords's brain
The bullet that was shot at Rep. Gabrielle Giffords's head didn't pass through the "geometric center" of her brain, allowing her to communicate with doctors Sunday morning, according to the Hospital where she's being treated. "The things that are most concerning are if the bullet crosses from one hemisphere to the other, one side to the other," Dr. Michael Lemole told reporters. "Those were not the case in this instance." Peter Rhee, a surgeon, said Giffords is un...

ABCs Bob Woodruff Offers Experience, Hope To Giffords In Recovering From Brain Injury
ABC News correspondent Bob Woodruff , who suffered a traumatic brain injury On Assignment in Iraq five years ago, is offering his unique perspective to the family of Gabrielle Giffords . “There is hope,” Woodruff writes in a “Reporter’s Notebook” piece on the ABC News website. Woodruff, who’d just been named a co-anchor of ABC’s World News, was severely injured by the Explosion of an IED. In telling his story online and on Good Morning America, Woodruff...

A Focus on Brain Injuries Following Giffords Shooting
Yahoo! Buzz Rep. Gabrielle Giffords is in critical condition following the Arizona shooting on Saturday that left six dead. Giffords was shot in the head but according to experts interviewed by the WSJ and other news outlets, her ability to respond to simple commands is a positive sign for her potential to recover. Physicians not involved in her care said the bullet, which passed through the left side of her brain, apparently damaged regions that aren’t as important for Speech and thinking...

Meet Your Arizona Superhero: Gabrielle Giffords Gay Latino Intern
Most modern-day interns spend a lot of time listening to hip-hop music on their iPods and refusing to perform any tasks that require actual intellectual or (gasp!) physical effort. How startling, then, that during Saturday’s awful massacre in Tuscon, one of these entitled Mileybots conclusively proved himself to be the Awesomest Intern In The History Of Ever. And in addition to being a brown, he is a gay. This University of Arizona junior, Daniel Hernandez, was only five days into his in...

Obama: Arizona Shooting Has America Shocked & Grieving
(AP) WASHINGTON - President Barack Obama said the nation is still shocked and grieving after Saturday's deadly shooting rampage in Arizona that killed six people and left a congresswoman in critical condition after being shot point-blank in the head. Speaking in the Oval Office Monday, Obama said Democratic Rep. Gabrielle Giffords is "still fighting". In total, 19 people were shot in the attack; among the six people killed were Arizona's chief Federal Judge, a 9-year-old girl interested in gov...

Giffords shooting leads nation to introspection and political finger wagging
In the wake of the shooting in Arizona this weekend that critically injured Rep. Gabrielle Giffords and that killed and injured more than 20 people, many pundits and politicians are pointing fingers. Others are hoping the incident will serve to ratchet down rancor. Yet emerging details make it clear the shooter wasn’t primarily motivated by politics, right or left. Jared Lee Loughner seems mainly to have been struggling with Mental Illness and was angry at being thrown out of Pima Communi...

Giffords environmental advocacy
By now you know the basic story: Arizona Rep. Gabrielle Giffords was shot in the head on Saturday while appearing at a "Congress on Your Corner" event in Tucson. The shooting killed six, among them a federal judge and a nine-year-old girl. Giffords herself seems to be responding to stimuli despite being gravely injured. The suspect, Jared Lee Loughner, is in custody, and while we don't know anything definitive about his motives, many Democrats are pointing out that Giffords -- a Blue Dog in a re...

Remembering Arizona's Victims
The US Capitol dome is shown in the background as flags fly at half staff in honor of the Victims of the shooting in Arizona that injured US Representative Gabrielle Giffords, at the Washington Monument in Washington January 9, 2011. You must login to comment. The Fox Nation is for those opposed to intolerance, excessive government control of our lives, and attempts to monopolize opinion or suppress freedom of thought, expression, and worship. Read more... We invite all Americans who share these...

Arizona's Eighth Congressional District Epitomized Over-The-Top Demonization Of Liberals
While it is critical to understand that Jared Loughner's Terrorist Attack on Rep. Gabrielle Giffords and dozens of her constituents over the weekend was not directly caused by the words of her political opponents, the tragedy in Arizona presents an opportunity to examine the nature of our political discourse. Giffords' district, the Arizona Eighth, is a prime example of overheated Rhetoric. Her 2010 campaign was plagued by Vandalism and death threats from anonymous citizens, as well as hyperbol...

Giffords Intern Talks Tucson Tragedy
College junior Daniel Hernandez was just days on the job when the shooting took place. He rushed in to help Victims including Democratic Arizona Rep. Gabrielle Giffords. See photos of the Gabrielle Giffords Shooting in Arizona. Take the poll: Is Political Rhetoric to Blame for Arizona Shooting? Follow the money in Congress. ...

Arizona shooting: Barack Obama leads a minute's silence
President Barack Obama has led a minute of silence across the United States for Gabrielle Giffords, the critically-injured Congresswoman, and the other Victims of the Tucson shooting....

Giffords aide in ICU with four shooting wounds
Rep. Gabrielle Giffords’s district director is still in the intensive care unit at University Medical Center after he was shot in the cheek and in the leg during Saturday’s shooting. Ron Barber, who has worked for Giffords since she was first sworn into Congress in 2007, was awake and spoke with a representative from the mayor’s office, according to Andrew Greenhill, the Chief of Staff to Tucson Mayor Bob Walker. Dr. Peter Rhee, the head of trauma at the Tucson Hospital, said...

Dem leader: Alleged shooter sought 'Second Amendment remedy'
Rep. James Clyburn said it is impossible not to connect fiery campaign Rhetoric to the shooting of Rep. Gabrielle Giffords (D-Ariz.).  The number three-ranking House Democrat invoked the Rhetoric of a Tea Party Senate Candidate in describing the actions of the man accused of shooting Giffords (D-Ariz.).  "He saw a Second Amendment remedy and that's what occurred here and there is no way not to make that connection," Clyburn said during an interview with the Charleston Post and Courier.