The Talk Show American

THE TALK SHOW AMERICAN: Woman Details Her 20-Year Coma

Friday, August 05, 2005

Woman Details Her 20-Year Coma

For 20 years, Sarah Scantlin was seemingly unaware of the world around her after she was hit by a drunk driver in an accident that sent her into a comatose state in September of 1984.

Then in February, she shocked her parents and doctors when she began to speak. In her first national television interview, after undergoing surgery on her long-unused limbs and speech therapy to unlock her long-dormant tongue, Scantlin speaks with The Early Show national correspondent Tracy Smith in a two-part interview to be broadcast Thursday and Friday.

Scantlin�s speech is still limited.

However, it seems that throughout her 20-year coma, she could see, hear, and understand what was going on around her. Shortly after she awoke, her father asked what she knew about events that had occurred years earlier.

"Sarah, what's 9/11?" her father asks. She responds, "Bad�fire�airplanes�building�hurt people."

Smith says there are other things deep in Scantlin�s brain that also survived the accident, such things as her favorite 1980s song "Summer Lovin�," which she even sings for The Early Show.

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