Nine-year-old Jordan Taylor Survives Orthopedic Decapitation

by Jon Azpiri | December 22, 2008 at 12:01 pm

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Nine-year-old Jordan Taylor has miraculously recovered from a car accident that separated his skull from his neck.

According to doctors, The Texas boy had a 1 to 2 percent chance of surviving this type of injury known as an orthopedic decapitation. Doctors managed to reattach Jordan’s skull with a metal plate and titanium rods. His head was stabilized carbon fiber ring that is screwed to his skull. Fortunately for Taylor, his spinal cord remained intact.

I just kept screaming,” Jordan’s mom, Stacey Perez told CBSNews.com. “I just wanted him to wake up.”

Perez was driving when a dump truck plowed into her car after running a stop sign, authorities said. Although Jordan was buckled up in the back seat, the impact was too much.

“The energy basically made his head lift up off his neck, and then move forward,” said Dr. Richard Roberts of Cook Childrens’ Medical Center in Fort Worth, Texas, the pediatric neurosurgeon that saved Jordan’s life.

“All of the connective tissue that essentially keeps your head connected to your neck was destroyed,” Roberts said.