Kootenai | Kootenai Health | Issue 3, 2021

By Devin Weeks It happened in an instant. The last thing Julie Wilson remembers before her traumatic brain injury on April 19, 2020, was riding bikes with three of her children just down the street from their house. She turned around to check on them. Then it was days later. “I don’t remember anything, truth be told,” the 39-year-old Coeur d’Alene mother of six said. “I was off my seat, that’s all I remember.” When Julie craned her head around to make sure her kiddos were OK, she went crashing to the ground. Her kids helplessly watched as she had a seizure. “For the kids, I was just staring at them and through them, and they were freaking out watching me, ‘What’s wrong with Mom!?’” Julie said. Jeffrey Larson, M.D., the neurosurgeon who quickly worked to save Julie’s life when she was rushed to Kootenai Health, said Julie’s injuries were critical. “She was riding her child’s bicycle without a helmet when the handlebars got caught on a fence, and she was thrown headfirst to the curb of a sidewalk,” Dr. Larson said. “She had obvious injury to her head, with bleeding coming from above her right ear where her head hit the sidewalk. She had a decreased level of consciousness and was confused.” A CT scan showed a skull fracture above a blood clot. Surgery proved that her skull was shattered, with a skull fragment lacerating and pressing into her brain in the right posterior temporal region. “If this were the left side, it may have permanently damaged her speech and ability to recognize people,” Dr. Larson said. Julie was admitted to the critical care unit to stabilize her and closely watch her neurologic function, with plans to repeat the brain CT at a set time to see if any other injuries developed. “She deteriorated neurologically shortly after she arrived at the ICU,” Dr. Larson said. “Repeat brain CT showed the hematoma beneath the fracture was getting bigger and pressing on the brain. I took her to surgery to explore the injury. Saved Mother of six survives a critical head injury, thanks to the team at Kootenai Health My Lif ’ ‘They Cliff Hampton, M.D. Jeffrey Larson, M.D. Craig Panos, M.D. 6