Louisiana Woman Awakens After Giving Birth with Blood Clot in Brain - East Idaho News
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Louisiana Woman Awakens After Giving Birth with Blood Clot in Brain

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Getty 070212 Ambulance?  SQUARESPACE CACHEVERSION=1341271595475iStockphoto/Thinkstock(NEW ORLEANS) — Tommy Scott came home from work on May 22 to find his wife Amber, who was nearly 38 weeks pregnant, lying immobile on the bed.

“She was conscious, but she was — it’s hard to describe — one eye was open and she was breathing heavily, but she couldn’t talk,” Tommy said.

Doctors at Slidell Memorial Hospital near New Orleans found that Amber Scott had a blood clot in her brain.  Amber underwent an emergency Caesarean section, delivering a healthy girl, Adeline, at 8:42 p.m.  Surgery to remove the blood clot immediately followed and was finished just after midnight.

Amber, a 29-year-old audiologist, was transferred to West Jefferson Medical Center on May 24 to undergo further treatment. She spent the next two weeks in a minimally conscious state. She was sometimes responsive to her environment and would try to move her arms spontaneously, said Dr. Andrea Toomer, one of her rehabilitation physicians.

On Friday, Amber was moved to the rehab unit to begin an extensive recovery process. “She has to start from scratch, like an infant. The main thing is they want her to feel at home, teach her how to get dressed again, teach her how to feed the baby, hold the baby,” Tommy said.

Holding Adeline was a milestone Amber reached Sunday, the first time she could see her baby, more than a month after giving birth to her.

“In physical therapy, they’ve been teaching her different facial expressions, like smiling, which looks kind of like a smirk right now. First thing when she saw Adeline, she had that smirk on her face,” Tommy said.

“By the time she leaves our rehab unit in three or four weeks, we think she’ll need minimal assistance to do her daily activities, doing maybe 75 percent of them herself. That’s in the short term. I think she’ll continue to improve beyond that,” Dr. Toomer said.

Tommy Scott said he knows they have a long road ahead of them but feels very hopeful.

“Compared to where we were a month ago, we didn’t know if she was going to survive. Now she’s in therapy and we’re talking about getting her home.”

Tommy feels especially grateful for the amount of support they’ve received.

“Of course we have our friends and family, but people we’ve never met across the country are contacting us.  I got a call from a lady in Miami who said she had gone through something very similar to Amber — she had a brain clot while pregnant — and wanted me to know that she and her baby were both fine now.”

Copyright 2012 ABC News Radio

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