14 DAY TRIAL // About three weeks ago, on September 15, 16-month-old Jackson Taylor, his mother Rylea and his 9-year-old sister Shayne were involved in a horrific car crash.
While driving on a highway in New South Wales, Australia, the family smashed into an oncoming car. The crash was so severe that Jackson Taylor's skull was completely dislocated from his spine.
His mother says that, the moment she pulled him from the wreck, she knew that his neck had been broken. Sure enough, X-rays revealed the boy's head and neck had, in fact, been pulled apart.
This type of injury is known as atlanto-occipital dislocation or internal decapitation. Basically, Jackson Taylor's skull was no longer connected to his spinal column.
Usually, this kind of damage is fatal. “A lot of children wouldn't survive that injury in the first place, and if they did and if they were resuscitated they may never more or breathe again,” surgeon Geoff Askin told Channel 7 News Melbourne in an interview.
Except Jackson Taylor survived the experience
Although the 16-month-old was in critical condition when he was rushed to hospital, medical expert Geoff Askin and his team agreed to operate on him and try to save his life.
Although the child's spinal column had been separated from the base of his skull in the car crash, his spinal cord wasn't injured. In the OR, medical experts worked to reattach the toddler's vertebrae using a piece of wire.
With the help of a rib bone fragment, they then secured the vertebrae in place. The intervention, which lasted about 6 hours, was a success. In a couple of months, during which time he will have to wear a head brace, the boy should make a full recovery.
Surgeon Geoff Askin and the team who assisted him on this case say that, once they remove the head brace, Jackson Taylor will go back to living a normal, healthy life.