Hospital calls girl's recovery 'a miracle'

<br>TEXARKANA, Texas (AP) _ A 12-year-old Oklahoma girl wounded in a hunting accident is home after what hospital officials call a ``miracle'' recovery. <br><br>Shiane Shelton of Wright City, Okla.,

Monday, December 10th 2001, 12:00 am

By: News On 6

TEXARKANA, Texas (AP) _ A 12-year-old Oklahoma girl wounded in a hunting accident is home after what hospital officials call a ``miracle'' recovery.

Shiane Shelton of Wright City, Okla., checked out of Wadley Regional Medical Center on Friday. She was wounded Nov. 20 while sitting in her uncle's pickup truck in a stand of woods in southeastern Oklahoma.

Her uncle fired a gun and the bullet ricocheted and pierced the truck door and Shiane's hip. The girl was airlifted to Wadley.

One doctor ``literally had his hands in her chest, massaging her heart, while they were doing a CT scan on her,'' said Brenda Thompson, assistant director of marketing and planning at Wadley.

``Three surgeons worked on her and they had to give her 21 units of blood in the first two hours of surgery. Nobody thought she would live.''

But she did live. Hospital staff members and nurses stopped by her room Friday to wish her well.

``She's our Christmas and Thanksgiving miracle,'' said Shelby Brown, Wadley director of marketing and planning. ``Everybody in the hospital was praying for her the whole time she was here.''

Her grandmother, Louise Fields, concurred with others' assessment of Shiane's story.

``It's absolutely a miracle,'' she said. ``Nobody expected her to live, and here she is, alive and well and going home to her family and friends. It's the greatest Christmas gift ever.''