Man saved after sides of skull cut off, frozen

Another article i read from ninemsn.com.au

A US man who shattered his skull while riding a longboard had a 95 percent chance of dying until neurosurgeons cut off each side of his swollen head and froze it.

Neurosurgeons said they performed the risky surgery on Kyle Johnson as a last-ditch effort because his brain swelled so uncontrollably after he fell off the board at about 60km/h, Fox News reports.

The surgery — a bilateral decompressive craniectomy — is normally performed on one side of the head.

"[But] Kyle had such a global brain injury that we needed to take both sides of his head off, and you just leave a small strip of bone right down the middle," said Dr Blake Welling from McKay-Dee Hospital in Utah.

Surgeons removed both sides of Mr Johnson's skull, put it together with screws and placed it in a deep freezer to stop the bone becoming brittle.

Mr Johnson was placed in a drug-induced coma for three weeks while doctors waited for the swelling to go down. They then reattached the bone flaps and he woke up after about one week.

"He had a very high mortality rate," Dr Welling said.

"I told him sometimes we're left with really terrible results, but in your case you have a guardian angel, you have something to live for."

Mr Johnson said he was undergoing mind exercises in therapy to assist with memory loss and multi-tasking.

He was not sure if he would ever ride a longboard again.

"But snowboarding for sure," he said.