Conference noted::bicycle

1928.0. "Hit & run victim recovers" by UBRKIT::CLELAND (USC_IM$T Data Center Services) Thu May 02 1991 08:31

	Boston Herald, Wednesday, May 1, 1991

	By Joe Heaney (reprinted without permission)

	   Police and doctors yesterday still marveled at the awesome way
	Cambridge bicyclist Kieko Udaka dodged death last month after being
	dragged two blocks beneath a hit and run car.

	   Udaka, 33, a 105-pound Japanese research physician, was also
	wondering - but giving full credit to miracles and modern medicine
	at Massachusetts General Hospital.

	   "Maybe it was because I was small enough to make it under there,"
	said Udaka, a cheerful 5'-2" post-graduate immunologist, discharged
	from MGH yesterday just 30 days after the bizarre collision.

	   "A month ago I was almost dead. And today I am going home," she
	said ambling along with the aid of a walker.

	   "Before long I will be swimming and hiking and bike-riding. No,
	I'm not afraid to ride a bicycle. But, I will be very careful."

	   Despite the horror of her predicament beneath the car, Udaka was
	able to provide police with a description of the car and still-at-
	large driver who fled the scene between Kendall and Central Squares.

	   Cambridge police Lt. James C. Grady recalled witnesses reporting
	sparks shooting out from beneath the car, & at first thought it was
	a fallen muffler scraping the pavement, not a bike.

	   "Bystanders told us the driver stopped several times and backed
	the car up trying to dislodge the bicycle and rider," Grady said,
	adding, "she was dragged about 130 yards."

	   Hospital records show Udaka arrived with multiple injuries incl-
	uding a broken back, collapsed lung, fractured ribs, blood in the
	chest cavity, a blood clot in the liver and severe "road burn" that
	cut through four layers of skin on her back; a partially severed
	ear, a broken wrist, and dislocated shoulder.

	   Hospital officials yesterday said a key to Udaka's recovery was
	an experimental state-of-the-art internal fixator that stabilized
	broken vertabra (sp?) during "very delicate microsurgery".

	   Neurosurgeons Chris Oglivy and Lawrence Borges, who led the
	recuperation effort, said Udaka will have to wear a brace for three
	months but has a good chance of full recovery.

	   Udaka said the last 30 days separates the worst and best days of
	her life. "I left my apartment at 3:20 a.m. and was hit at 3:30 a.m.
	at the corner of Main and Windsor streets," Udaka recalled.

	   "It was awful. I had a terrible time breathing. And today I am
	going home. I am not dead. I am not paralyzed from the waist down.
	This is the happiest day of my life."

	End-of-article

	The caption on the photo read, "Great strides: Kieko Udaka is
	accompanied by nurse Joanie O'Donell as she walks yesterday at Mass.
	General Hospital."

	This is one very brave lady, I hope she does recover...

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