A teenager who had “a miraculous recovery” from severe brain and spinal injuries in a car crash died two months later in an “exceptionally rare” medical event.
Ryan Doyle, 19, was a back seat passenger in a silver Volkswagen Golf which failed to take a bend on a road in 2016.
An inquest into Mr Doyle’s death heard he suffered major bleeding over two months later while a doctor was removing a tube from his airways in Beaumont Hospital on November 22, 2016.
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Mr Doyle from Cornacreeva, Ballinamore, Co Leitrim, went into cardiac arrest and died a short time later.
A sitting of Dublin District Coroner’s Court last week heard that Mr Doyle was found “hanging from the back window of the vehicle” following the crash at Drumreilly, Ballinamore.
He was brought by ambulance to Cavan General Hospital and subsequently transferred to Beaumont Hospital in Dublin because of the severity of his injuries.
Consultant neurosurgeon Stephen McNally said scans had shown severe abnormalities in the patient’s brain, while he also suffered a fracture of the spine as well as significant injuries to his lungs.
The inquest heard two operations to remove a piece of glass from his lungs were unsuccessful.
Mr McNally said Mr Doyle had done “far better and extremely well” than medical staff had predicted on his admission to hospital.
He told the inquest: “For such a severe injury, he was breaking all the rules.”
The inquest was told the car in which Mr Doyle was a passenger was probably travelling in excess of the speed limit of 80kph and the driver was more than two times over the legal drink-driving limit.
Liam Taylor, 26, of Aughavas, Ballinamore, Co Leitrim was given a suspended 16-month prison sentence in July 2020 and disqualified from driving for 15 years after pleading guilty to careless driving causing death.
Coroner Clare Keane heard a postmortem showed Mr Doyle died as a result of hypovolemic shock and bleeding as a result of a fistula between an artery and his windpipe arising from injuries sustained in the crash.
Based on the evidence, Dr Keane returned a verdict of medical misadventure.
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