How Sherlock Survived a Cardiac Arrest

[wellingtongoose]

The Most Miraculous Thing

The medical explanation I am about to give for Sherlock’s survival is nowhere near as uplifting or exhilaration as watching Sherlock struggling out the steps of his mind palace with the sheer determination to live for John. If you want to keep thinking about Sherlock’s “revival” as a miracle of love and a testimony to our

Comments

[marysutherland]

Thanks for writing about this - very interesting to know some of the medical details. One more question, if I may: apart from the possible damage to the brain from the heart attack which you mention, would it be normal to make a full physical recovery from a shot like that, or is there irreparable damage to bodily functions?

[wellingtongoose]

Actually another upside of being shot in the liver is that you do not need all of your liver to function normally. In fact you can live perfectly well with only 30% of your liver (unlike loosing a kidney). Additionally the liver does have the capacity to regenerate. Even if the doctors needed to remove part of Sherlock's liver he could still go back to normal.

The most important thing is the inferior vena cava repair. However we know that the surgeons must have repaired it properly because Sherlock revives, so the vein is functioning well.

[kizzia]

Thank you so much for this - I watched the episode with a medical professional who said pretty much what you did but I couldn't remember all the terms etc and it's brilliant to have it all set out clearly, so I can re-read and absorb at my leisure.

Also, If you'd like me to, I can check the RAMC medical journal archive to see if they have any mentions of recoveries like Sherlock's - unless you've checked them already?

[wellingtongoose]

I have checked pubmed and have two cases - but pubmed generally doesn't list anything older than 1960-1970s. Perhaps if you have access to other archives you might be able to get other cases?

[grypas]

As a librarian mainly working with Medical Doctors I have full text access to a number of on-line journals. Feel free to use me

[wellingtongoose]

Thanks for the info :)

[shadowfireflame]

Ah, this is fascinating. Thanks for writing it all up with all the medical terminology. It's great to know Mary's reasoning behind where she shot Sherlock as well.

[grypas]

Thank you for your meta on the subject. I was more than curious about the whole aspect of his injury.

What about rehabilitation? Did he spend weeks in the hospital? When at home would Sherlock need assistance and monitoring in everyday basis? (Insert Wiggins and Sherlock's "day job" comment, unless it's the drug den that Wiggins is monitoring and not Sherlock)

It's Christmas and his mother says: "We are here because Sherlock is home from hospital and we are all very happy." I might not interpreting it correctly but wedding in August, shot in September and well Christmas... (IF we use John's blog entries as points of reference)
Well, English isn't my mother tongue so I'm probably reading it wrong and the phrase "home from hospital" doesn't mean that someone just got out of hospital. Or maybe I'm biased because I would focus on the fact that he has healed and is healthy and I would "delete" and ban any hospital related conversations.

Wedding date

[ruahnna]

Unless I missed something, or something changed, Mary told Mrs. Hudson at the end of The Empty Hearse that they were thinking of a May wedding, not an August one. Given that Mary is preggers at the wedding itself, I presume she is ready to pop at Christmas. (Still praying for a safe delivery and a bouncing baby Watson--I don't think I can bear for John to undergo that sort of loss

Re: Wedding date

[wellingtongoose]

The timeline really confuses me to no end. I think I gave up trying to wrap my head around it. The truth is I'm not completely sure that the writers have actually plotted out the timeline in any great deals. They do have a vague idea so that the characters can talk about their own space-time continuum without contradicting each other. However I find it terribly difficult to pin-point stuff but the speculation was fun to read.

Re: Wedding date

[swanpride]

It depends on the writer...Thompson is very malicious. TBB for all it's fault is so precise, even the weekdays match up with the dates given. Gatiss is the worst of the three...I have tried to line-up The Great Game, and nothing matches up time-wise, he jumps from day to night with no rhyme or reason. It's fortunate that HOB and TEH happen in two days respectively.
Moffat loves this long time jumps - which currently jumped so far ahead that the show is now playing in the future (around next Christmas) - this has the advantage that they can easily pick up where they left off after the hiatus.

[nathaniel_hp]

Thank you for this analysis. It's great to be able to look at this from a different perspective.

And you know, I can't get over the fact that those doctors would have spent hours doing CPR to keep Sherlock alive. For some reason it touches me much more than Sherlock's desperate escape from his mind palace did.