Surgeons reattach toddler’s head after internal decapitation

Team of surgeons perform six-hour surgery on Jason Taylor in Brisbane hospital

Surgeons at a Brisbane hospital have reattached the head of a toddler to his spine after he was internally decapitated in a car crash.

One-year-old Jaxon Taylor was travelling in the car with his mother and nine-year-old sister when they collided with another car at a speed of 110kph.

The 16-month-old toddler’s head was torn from his neck internally.

He was airlifted to a Brisbane hospital where a team of surgeons, headed by Dr Geoff Askin, performed the six-hour surgery to reattach the head to the spine.

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“A lot of children wouldn’t survive that injury in the first place and if they did, and they were resuscitated, they may never move or breathe again,” said Dr Askin.

Doctors said Jaxon will have to wear a brace over his head for eight weeks to help the tissues and nerves connecting his head to his spine to heal.

“It is a miracle,” Jaxon’s mother Rylea told 7 News Melbourne.