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Woodruff, Emerging From Sedation, Jokes With Family: Brother Says ABC Anchor Also Walking

Posted on: Wednesday, 8 March 2006, 06:00 CST

By Julie Edgar, Detroit Free Press

Mar. 8--ABC News anchor Bob Woodruff, laid low by a bomb blast in Iraq in late January, started ribbing his family Monday -- a sign he is truly on the mend, his brother said Tuesday.

The Bloomfield Township native and Cranbrook graduate is still heavily medicated at the National Naval Medical Center in Bethesda, Md., mainly to control pain.

But he is able to converse for short periods with family members and doctors, to walk with assistance and even to speak in Chinese and German, said Dave Woodruff, a Birmingham resident.

"We were thrilled," Woodruff said from New York, adding that his brother's utterances were unintelligible to those around him.

"I don't think anybody in the room spoke Chinese," he said, laughing.

Dave Woodruff said his brother woke up Monday morning and started asking where he was and how long he had been there.

Then, when his wife, Lee Woodruff, walked in, Bob Woodruff said, "Hi, sweetie," his brother said.

"Next thing you know, he's having conversations -- not long ones -- but he's finally off sedation drugs.

"They told us all along through this process that he would suddenly come to. The brain finds a way to kick itself on, and apparently that's what happened," Dave Woodruff said.

"He's alert. He's awake. The great news, too, is he's joking around a little bit."

After Dave Woodruff spoke to Diane Sawyer on Tuesday's "Good Morning America" show, he spoke to his brother, who told him he had done a great job.

"It was great to hear his voice," Dave Woodruff said.

Bob Woodruff, 44, has been hospitalized since the Jan. 29 blast, which left him with a broken shoulder blade and skull injuries.

He and a news crew were in Taji, Iraq, filming with a convoy of Iraqi security forces vehicles when a roadside bomb detonated. Woodruff and his cameraman, Doug Vogt, were standing in the hatch of a mechanized vehicle.

Vogt went home to France on Feb. 23.

Doctors kept Woodruff sedated until recently, a strategy to keep his body still while brain swelling decreases, said Dr. Panos Varelas, director of the Neuro Intensive Care Unit at Henry Ford Hospital in Detroit.

Sedation, he said, is used primarily in the first 10 days after the injury to "buy time" while the pressure on the brain subsides. Elevated pressure on the brain can cause permanent damage, Varelas said.

Varelas, who noted that he is not familiar with Bob Woodruff's injuries, said it's too early in the recovery period to determine a person's long-term prospects. Varelas said there could be diffuse or deep injuries, both of which can determine the treatment and the future.

But even patients with severe head injuries can recover totally, especially if they are young like Woodruff, Varelas said.

Weeks before Woodruff left for Tel Aviv, Israel, and then Iraq, he took the "ABC World News Tonight" helm, coanchoring with Elizabeth Vargas. They replaced Peter Jennings, who died in August.

Woodruff's wife and four children -- 14-year-old Mack, 12-year-old Cathryn and 5-year-old twins Nora and Claire -- along with his parents, Fran and Robert Woodruff, and brothers, including Mike and Jim, have been taking turns at Bob Woodruff's bedside.

Dave Woodruff said doctors at the Bethesda medical center are evaluating his brother and the family is looking into rehabilitation facilities closer to Bob Woodruff's home in Rye, N.Y.

Contact JULIE EDGAR at 248-351-3294 or jedgar@freepress.com.

photo

ABC News anchor Bob Woodruff, a Bloomfield Township native, was severely injured in an explosion Jan. 29 in Taji, Iraq.

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Source: Detroit Free Press

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