Young woman's life resets after months in a coma

A 26-year-old woman has recovered and was finally discharged from hospital after a surgery successfully repaired an opening connecting her esophagus and air tube, the Shanghai Chest hospital announced on Wednesday.

The hole was caused by her requiring long-time trachea intubation after a stroke. The woman was unable to talk or eat and suffered repeated lung infections for three months due to the opening.

She had become pregnant months earlier, but the pregnancy caused a hyperfunction of her blood system, resulting in dropped thrombus blocking brain vessels, leading to a stroke.

Her pregnancy had to be terminated and the woman required treatment at the Intensive Care Unit. After she woke from a coma a month later, doctors found an opening between her esophagus and air tube, resulting in digestive fluid entering the lung directly, causing repeated pneumonia, fever and respiratory failure – all requiring medical responses.

She was unable to talk or swallow due to the opening.

Her family visited many hospitals and were told there was no medical solution.

When the husband went to the Shanghai Chest Hospital, Dr Yao Feng accepted his wife as a patient and started to design delicate surgical plans.

Ti Gong

Yao's team also contacted the patient's previous doctors to have a better understanding of her condition and devised detailed plans and emergency pre-plans.

"When we opened the chest, it was in chaos," Yao said. "The air tube was seriously swollen and stuck together. The scars caused by long-term infections made the anatomical structure unable to be seen."

Doctors spent hours to clean the structure and successfully repair the opening.

The patient expressed her gratitude to all her medics and said it was the first time she had all the tubes and hoses removed and could talk and eat freely.

"It was a nightmare in the past months, when I was living in a vegetative state. It is so good to return to a normal life," she said. "My life resets from now."