Brian is Better!

Wife’s latest update on hit and run victim encouraging.

Updated 2:57 PM EST, Fri, Dec 5, 2008

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The good news as of Friday morning:

Brian Hickey is off the ventilator and breathing on his own. He’s been more active.

Wife Angie writes that Hickey squeezed his nurse’s hand, on command. He put up his thumb for his neurosurgeon. He opened his eyes for about 30 seconds during respiratory care.

Angie asked him to raise his thumb if he was in pain and he raised his entire arm.

Overall, Hickey is showing progress. He is in a great deal of pain, according to the medical staff at Cooper Hospital.

His brain was swollen from the accident, so doctors took out two pieces of his skull to ease some of the pressure and Hickey was put into a medically induced coma. Monday, he was brought out of the medically induced coma, but as of

Friday morning, his wife wrote that she has only seen his eyes open in response to pain or someone doing something to him.

Wife Angie has been updating friends and family on Brian Hickey’s condition. Hickey has been in a coma for a week now. Last Friday, a car slammed into Brian as he was walking to the Patco Speedline in Westmont, N.J. The driver fled the scene, leaving a badly hurt Brian in the road. Wife Angie has been updating friends and family on Brian Hickey’s condition. Hickey has been in a coma for a week now. Last Friday, a car slammed into Brian as he was walking to the Patco Speedline in Westmont, N.J. The driver fled the scene, leaving a badly hurt Brian in the road.