The NFL safety team doctor, Damar Hamlin, said on Thursday that he was “awake and breathing,” and was able to communicate by writing with pen and paper on Wednesday night and at the same time. asked who won the match between the Bills and the Bengals, where he went into cardiac arrest.
Dr. Timothy A. Pritts said: “When he asked if we had won, the answer was yes, you know, Damar, you won, you won the game of life.
Pritts and Dr. William Knight of the University of Cincinnati Medical Center told reporters during a news conference on Thursday that the communication was a positive sign.
Pritts said Hamlin is moving his limbs, but Knight says it’s “really too early” to determine if Hamlin can make a full recovery and be able to return to professional football.
“We know he’s at home and it looks like all the cylinders are working in his brain,” Pritts said. “It made all of us extremely happy for the nurses, respiratory therapists and caregivers as well as for his family and others outside.”
More on the fall of Damar Hamlin
Knight and Pritts don’t have a definite answer as to what caused Hamlin’s heart to stop, but Knight said that “exams will continue to be conducted as he continues to progress.”
They repeatedly thanked the Bills and Bengals paramedics for their quick support of Hamlin, which they say saved his neurological function. Knight said the Bills’ medical team quickly realized that Hamlin was in cardiac arrest and followed up by resuscitating him immediately.
However, Knight said, it is too early to say whether Hamlin will regain better motor function and things like perception, movement, speech and language will need to be evaluated in the future.
More than 220,000 people have combined to contribute more than $7 million to the GoFundMe page Hamlin created two years ago for a toy drive serving his hometown. Pritts said that doctors told Hamlin “there will be plenty of toys for him to buy when he recovers from all this.”
On Monday night, horrified Bills players watched Hamlin, 24, lying on the field and paramedics trying to restart his heart after he collapsed and fell backwards. after a routine tackle against the Cincinnati Bengals. Hamlin stayed on the field for 10 minutes before being transported to the hospital.
The game has been paused and Bills recipient Stefon Diggs has shown in a hoodie and sweatpants walking into the hospital. That evening, the team flew back to Buffalo.
Dorrian Glenn, Hamlin’s uncle, told reporters on Wednesday: “I’m not a person to cry but I’ve never cried so much in my life. “Only to find out my grandson basically died on the field and they brought him back to life – it’s heartbreaking.”
The Bills returned to practice on Thursday in preparation for Sunday’s game against the New England Patriots, after hosting a practice session on Wednesday.
The federation has yet to make an official decision on whether or not to end the game, which was halted about nine minutes into the first half. Troy Vincent, the NFL’s executive vice president of football operations, said it won’t be resuming this week and “everything is under review.” The game is crucial in the AFC knockout, and with the final week of regular games of the season commencing on Saturday, the NFL faces key competitive questions as they hope. Hamlin will recover.
However, both the Bills and Bengals are gearing up to play their originally scheduled games. The Bills, who are scheduled to take on the New England Patriots on Sunday, had a walkout on Wednesday, a practice format in which teams typically take innings without a single-pad. comfortable way. The session was closed to the news media. The Bengali said on Twitter that they plan to take on the Baltimore Ravens on Sunday afternoon.
Hamlin, who was selected in the sixth round of the 2021 NFL draft, became a starter earlier this season when All-Pro safety player Micah Hyde suffered a neck injury. Through 15 games and 13 starts, Hamlin has 63 individual tackles – second in the team.
When Hamlin was hospitalized, the Bills safely signed Jared Mayden from the Jets’ training team and released full-back Xavier Rhodes, announced the move on social media on Wednesday. The transaction is another reminder of the ruthless follow-up culture in America’s most popular sport, where teams must quickly move on and replace players who could suffer life-changing injuries.
Buffalo, Cincinnati and Kansas City are all racing for the AFC’s No. 1 seed, a position that carries home advantage throughout the knockout stages until the Super Bowl.
Anything but treating the game as a draw would require the federation to adjust the final week of the season and the knockouts, or make these teams play for short periods of time, which creates the risk of injury. higher injury.
