By Jennifer Medina
The New York Times
January 19, 2011
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/01/20/us/20giffords.html?_r=1&hp

Representative Gabrielle Giffords, who survived a gunshot through her head on Jan. 8, is likely to leave the intensive care unit of a Tucson hospital on Friday and move to the TIRR Memorial Hermann Rehabilitation Hospital in Houston to continue her recovery, a spokesman for Ms. Giffords said on Wednesday.

Her aides said that the timing of the move may change depending on Ms. Giffords’s health.

Ms. Giffords’ doctors have said repeatedly that she was making remarkable progress, considering the severity of her injury, but that it was impossible to predict how she would recover.

Her husband, Capt. Mark Kelly, a Naval officer and astronaut who lives in Houston, said in a statement that he chose the facility there in part because it is closer to Tucson and Ms. Giffords’s congressional district in southeastern Arizona than other centers the family considered.

“The congresswoman’s family wants to ensure she receives the best rehabilitative care possible for her type of serious penetrating brain injury,” said Dr. Michael Lemole, one of the neurosurgeons who have been treating Ms. Giffords at the University Medical Center in Tucson.

Mr. Kelly said in the statement: “I am extremely hopeful at the signs of recovery that my wife has made since the shooting. The team of doctors and nurses at U.M.C. has stabilized her to the point of being ready to move to the rehabilitation phase. Their goal — and our goal — has been to provide Gabby with the best care possible.”

Mr. Kelly said the center in Houston “has a national reputation for treating serious penetrating brain injuries, and is also in a community where I have family and a strong support network.”

On Tuesday, Ms. Giffords’s mother sent an exuberant e-mail message to family and friends describing remarkable progress by her daughter. According to the e-mail, Ms. Giffords scrolled through photographs on her husband’s iPhone, tried to undo his tie and shirt and even began to look at get-well cards and pages of large-print text taken from a Harry Potter book.

“Every day, Gabby improves, and shows higher levels of comprehension and complex actions,” Ms. Giffords’s mother, Gloria, wrote, in a message that may paint an overly optimistic picture of the congresswoman’s condition. Doctors have said that the congresswoman is severely injured and faces a very long road to recovery.

Friends and family members said Mrs. Giffords sent the message out early Tuesday morning. Recipients forwarded it to others and a copy was later sent to The New York Times. The message predicted that the center in Houston would be chosen, though aides to Ms. Giffords said at the time that no final decision had yet been made.

Ms. Giffords’s doctors said she remained in serious condition and was not yet trying to speak.

Dr. Randall S. Friese, a trauma surgeon who has operated on Ms. Giffords, said on Monday that Mr. Kelly had told him he believed Ms. Giffords was now smiling.

“I wasn’t there,” Dr. Friese said. “Mark told me that he thought he may have seen her smile. We’re all very optimistic so we could be wrong. So we all want to see the best but sometimes we see what we want to see. But if he says she’s smiling then I buy it.”

TIRR Memorial Hermann Rehabilitation Hospital is widely recognized as having one of the top rehabilitation centers in the country and specializes in brain and spinal cord injuries.

In 2007, Buffalo Bills tight end Kevin Everett went through rehabilitation at the hospital to recover from a life-threatening spinal cord injury he sustained during a football game.

Meanwhile, the Pima County Sheriff’s Department issued a statement Wednesday that it would not release to the public any more information on the shooting case due to a dispute with the office of County Attorney Barbara LaWall.

Prosecutors have complained about the sheriff department’s release to the media of many details of the investigation of Jared L. Loughner, 22, who has been charged in federal court with murder and attempted murder of five federal officials.

“Until further notice, due to a controversy between the Sheriff’s Department and the County Attorney’s office, no further information reference the January 8, 2011 shooting will be released,” Deputy Jason Organ, the department’s public information officer, said in a statement