Brain-injured firefighter”s sudden recovery is baffling

NEW YORK – Nearly 10 years after a brain injury left a firefighter virtually mute, he suddenly started talking to his wife and sons last weekend.

Normally, brain-injured patients who get better do so within the first five years, especially in the first two years, and usually the change is gradual.

So what’s the explanation for the firefighter’s sudden improvement?

“We really don’t know for sure what’s going on,” says Anthony Stringer, director of neuropsychology at the Emory University School of Medicine.

While the answer might involve some long-delayed change in the brain, experts said Tuesday, a sudden improvement might also result from a change in medications or treatment of some other medical condition that’s been suppressing mental function.

Firefighter Donald Herbert, 43, of Buffalo, N.Y., was injured in December 1995, when the roof of a burning home collapsed on him. He went without oxygen for several minutes before he was rescued, and he ended up blind with little, if any, memory. He was largely mute and showed little awareness of his surroundings.

But last Saturday, he suddenly asked for his wife, Linda. And over the next 14 hours, until he fell asleep early Sunday, he chatted with family and friends, catching up on what he’d missed.

“How long have I been away?” Herbert had asked.

“We told him almost 10 years,” said his uncle, Simon Manka. “He thought it was only three months.”

The nursing home and the family have declined to describe his condition since then or discuss medical details of the case.