Accident victim Priya Ali, who was unconscious for more than two weeks, has recovered and was discharged from the Georgetown Public Hospital yesterday around noon.
Ali’s mother Zena yesterday expressed joy at her daughter returning home after leaving to go for a fateful walk with her aunt and uncle almost four weeks ago.
The happy mother told Stabroek News that her daughter is not speaking to anyone but only nodding her head when asked something. It appears that the child is still in shock after the traumatic accident and will take some time to fully recover, the woman opined. She also cannot walk on her own but has to be carried around. She has to be taken for regular visits at the hospital. The woman said that no matter what she has to do for her daughter she will do it because all that matters now is that she is alive.
Priya’s father Chetram Chabiram also spoke to this newspaper yesterday, relating his optimism that his daughter’s recovery has come so far. However he was a bit skeptical over her discharge as in his opinion the doctors should have kept her a little longer for observation since she is not eating solid foods or walking on her own as yet.
Priya was attached to a life support machine in the Intensive Care Unit of the Georgetown Hospital for more that two weeks after a car collided with her and dragged her some distance at Land of Canaan around 8 pm on July 6. Priya was at the time strolling southwards along the road with her aunt Nazeena Ali and her husband, Himnauth Agard.
The family had held their hopes high even though for a while there was not much physical evidence that the child was going to recover. Her father had related to Stabroek News about two weeks ago that she would gain consciousness and barely open her eyes for a few seconds but could not focus on anything. Sometimes she would grip his hand tightly when he held hers Chabiram had said.
Doctors had told the family that the broken parts of Priya’s body-her hips and left shoulder- were not as serious a problem as her head injuries.
The accident that caused Priya’s injuries had taken the lives of five young men, all friends, who were returning from a day of fun at a creek on the Linden Highway. Jason and Julian Martin, Colin Fredericks, Ezra Ferguson, and Royston Dempster all of from Plaisance, East Coast Demerara perished that night. (Melissa Charles)
