11-Year-Old Girl Dies in Hospital After Impaling Herself With Curtain Rod
An 11-year-old girl from Utah died Monday evening after she impaled herself with a curtain rod in a gruesome freak accident.
Nikki Clark had been climbing the stairs outside of her parent's house in Pleasant View, Utah on Saturday morning when she tripped and stabbed herself in the chest with the metal window blind rod she was carrying, according to KSL-TV.
A family spokesman said that the rod had scratched her spine and exited through her neck, and when she pulled it out the injury got even worse and resulted in massive blood loss.
"She immediately bled out within two minutes," Nikki's aunt Brandi Babbitt told KSL-TV.
Despite being immediately taken to McKay-Dee Hospital where Nikki underwent emergency surgery, doctors were unable to revive her.
"They did everything they could and she's been on life support since then. Yesterday there was some brain activity. As of this morning, there isn't any," Babbitt said on Monday afternoon, according to fox13now.com.
On Monday, Nikki's family announced that they were considering removing Nikki from life support on Tuesday after doctors declared her brain dead, but the little girl succumbed to her injuries and died around 7 p.m. Monday before her family could make the hard decision.
"It's a bad time of year, and especially for a child. You wouldn't wish that on anyone and for that to be happening to us, it's hard," Babbitt said, according to KSL-TV.
Babbitt said that Nikki loved to swim and enjoyed spending time with her parents and two sisters. She is said to have been a kind-hearted girl who put others before herself.
"Nikki was the child that when she walked into the room, she wanted to know if you were okay," Babbitt said, according to fox13now.com.
Her family has decided to donate some of her organs, and she will be buried next to her great-grandmother at Hyde Park Cemetery in Cache Valley.
Her family now has a mountain of medical bills from the costly surgeries and is accepting donations to help cover her expenses.