Just one week ago, Aimee Copeland, 24, was enjoying a trip kayaking down a creek with some of her friends in Carrollton, Ga. But when Copeland stopped to ride on a homemade zip line along the water, the line snapped and cut a large gash in her left calf.
Now the University of West Georgia graduate psychology student is in critical condition after a flesh-eating bacterium entered her body through the wound in her calf, causing her leg to be amputated Friday night, the Atlanta Journal-Constitution reported.
The Facebook page, “Believe and pray for a miracle to happen for Aimee Copeland” has been set up for people to stay updated on Copeland’s progress. According to an early post on the page by her father, Andy Copeland, the doctors had said her chances for survival are “slim to none.”
But the father, in an interview Wednesday evening with FoxNews.com, said his daughter had shown remarkable progress.
"Aimee has made drastic improvements today," Andy Copeland told FoxNews.com. "Yesterday she had some setbacks. She was really on the ventilator 100 percent, but now she's only requiring 60 percent of the ventilator, and last night she moved her arms."
Initially, Copeland had gone to the emergency room at the Tanner Medical Center in Carrollton last week after she had received the gash. She thought the ordeal was over after the doctors stapled her leg up with 22 staples and told her to take pain medication, according to her father.
But Copeland returned to the hospital after she continued to complain of severe pain in her leg. She was prescribed pain killers and sent home yet again.
The pain still did not subside, so a friend drove a “pale and weak” Copeland to Tanner Medical again Friday morning. When she arrived, an ER doctor diagnosed her with “necrotizing fasciitis” – a flesh-eating disease of the deep layers of the skin – in her damaged leg.
RELATED: Necrotizing Fasciitis (Flesh-Eating Bacteria) - Treatment Overview
“The surgeons advised me that they wanted to try to save her leg, but at this point saving her life took precedence,” Copeland’s father wrote on the Facebook page. “They removed all of the infected tissue and advised that she would have limited, if any use of her leg.”
Copeland was then life-lighted to JMS Burn Center in Augusta, Ga., where doctors rushed her into surgery and performed a high-hip amputation of her left leg. After surgery, Copeland suffered a cardiac arrest, but the doctors were able to resuscitate her.
Copeland’s friends have set up a website where people can donate blood and money to help save their friend’s life.
Click for more from MyFoxAtlanta.com.
Click for more from Atlanta Journal-Constitution.
Click for updates on Copeland’s progress.
Read more: http://www.foxnews.com/health/2012/05/09/woman-contracts-flesh-eating-bacteria-after-zip-lining-accident/#ixzz1uS42qrqB
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