Jerusalem – Doctors plan to begin the delicate process of reviving Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon from a medically induced coma today and start assessing the scope of any brain damage he might have suffered during a massive stroke last week.
Sharon, 77, underwent a scheduled brain scan Sunday to measure intracranial pressure and look for new bleeding. The results showed the condition of his brain had improved slightly, consistent with two previous scans taken since the last emergency surgery to stop hemorrhaging.
Shlomo Mor-Yosef – director of Hadassah-Ein Kerem Hospital, where Sharon is being treated – said the most recent test showed that swelling in Sharon’s brain had declined overnight. His overall condition remained critical but stable.
“In light of all these factors, the panel of experts decided to start the process of taking him out of the sedation” this morning, Mor-Yosef said. “This all depends, of course, on whether the prime minister makes it until tomorrow without any significant incidents.”
The announcement came as Sharon’s Cabinet convened for its first regular meeting since the prime minister was taken to the hospital Wednesday evening complaining of chest pain. He suffered what doctors described as a severe stroke, followed by extensive bleeding in the right half of his brain that took surgeons three rounds of emergency surgery to stanch.
His doctors said the left side of his brain, which controls speech and other important faculties in right-handed people such as Sharon, may not have suffered damage from the hemorrhage-induced swelling, as they had originally feared.
Doctors said Sharon will be roused in carefully monitored phases.
Ehud Olmert, the deputy prime minister who has taken over temporarily during Sharon’s incapacitation, ran the meeting from his regular chair at the side of a larger one usually occupied by his longtime political ally.
“Israeli democracy is strong, and all institutions are functioning in a stable, serious and responsible manner,” Olmert said. “This is how it should be, and this is how it will continue.”
Olmert, a former Jerusalem mayor and longtime hawk on the political scene, is a leading candidate to succeed Sharon as head of his Kadima party should the prime minister be unable to return to politics. Many doctors and politicians believe that will be the case.
Party unity appeared to receive a boost Sunday when Shimon Peres, the one-time Labor leader and former prime minister, ended his silence about whether he would continue with Kadima or return to his old party by telling Israel Radio he supported Olmert.
