MELBOURNE, Australia — Australian doctors reattached the head of a toddler after a car accident caused an internal decapitation.
Jaxon Taylor, 16-months-old, was in the car with his mother and sister when they collided head on into another vehicle at about 70 miles per hour, the Independent reported.
The force of the crash was so severe that it broke the toddler’s C1 and C2 vertebrae and his collarbone.
Spinal surgeon Dr. Geoff Askin and his team were able to reattach the toddler’s vertebrae during a six-hour operation, using wire and a piece of his rib to graft them together.
“A lot of children wouldn’t survive that injury in the first place, and if they did and they were resuscitated then they may never move or breathe again,” Askin said.
The doctor said Jaxon’s injury was the worst of its kind he had ever seen.
Jaxon will wear a halo traction device for eight weeks to help the bones fuse back together, and he is expected to make a complete recovery.