I have been keeping up with Gabby's recovery every day on CNN.com and the news is ver encouraging from opening her eyes, trying to hug her husband, and regaining control over her arms and legs. I wouldn't be suprised if she is upgraded in the next couple of days to serious condition. We're long past the 72-96 hours when swelling usually will set in after a shot to the head, so this is very good news.
She's opening her eyes because the doctors are weaning her off sedation.
The news here is that she was able to respond to complex commands and execute equally complex motor actions in response to them. Particularly notable is this:
Previously, Giffords had been asked to give a thumbs up, and gave an outstretched hand, instead. That was interpreted by the news story as her being extra excited, basically, but as a neurologist you're not necessarily too happy about that; it could indicate that she can only make gross motor actions.
Here, however, she responded correctly to a commend that required fine motor control, attention, and semantic knowledge (i.e., being able to find the small, shiny metal thing on his finger, knowing that that small, shiny metal thing is a "wedding ring", and specifically "his" wedding ring, guiding her hand to the wedding ring, and being able to coordinate her hand motions well enough to touch it), which is quite encouraging.
It's also important that she proceeded to grab the rest of his hand after that and perform some more actions, because it lends more credence to the media's supposition that extending her whole hand was a sign that she was just "overenthusiastic" or something rather than being incapable of responding correctly to a command.
I'm glad you pointed that out, I haven't mentioned it to anyone, but she did do the
wrong task when asked to give a thumbs up. Overenthusiastic would have been two thumbs up. I hope she fully recovers, but the medias outlook isn't going to determine how she recovers so I think its alright that we continue to criticize the media as per usual.
I really hope she fully recovers, and if she is able to fully recover --I think she would make a run for the Presidency one day. Its a nice thought at least. The reality of her fully recovering is doubtful unfortunately, she did get shot in the head.
