Nottingham Forest’s striker, Taiwo Awoniyi has reportedly regained consciousness after induced coma following urgent surgery to address a critical abdominal injury.
The Nigerian international sustained an injury after a collision with a goalpost in the final moments of Forest’s 2-2 draw against Leicester City on Sunday.
Awoniyi suffered a ruptured intestine from the impact and on Monday, he was rushed to the hospital where he underwent the first phase of a complex surgical procedure to repair the damage.
It was gathered that the 27-year-old was placed in an induced coma on Tuesday to allow doctors to closely monitor his condition.
On Wednesday, the second stage of the surgery was completed, and the medical staff successfully brought him out of the induced coma.
In a chat with BBC Sport, consultant colorectal surgeon Professor Gillian Tierney said injuries of such nature are dangerous.He said:
“The injury is really serious. It is potentially life-threatening. It is very easy to miss at the point of contact and can take hours to diagnose.
“In a hospital setting we would send a patient for a CT scan which could take up to 10 hours.
“If it occurred to an athlete who was super fit, very muscular and was running on adrenaline then I think it would be extremely understandable to miss it. Fluid leaking from the intestine would not be easy to diagnose straight away.”
