Can someone survive being shot in the brain and heart?

[Anonymous]

if an assassin tried to kill someone and shot them in the head first before shooting them a second time in the heart. What is the chances of that person surviving? Can you survive?

Yes

No

[MTC29]

There are cases or deranged people attempting suicide by drilling holes into their brin and surviving. A drill bit, which drills a neat hole, is not a bullet. Bullets do all sorts of serious damage. In addition, where you are shot will determine if there is any chance of survival. The frontal lobe of the brain contains the primary motor cortex, which essentially "runs" your body. Take a bullet in the forehead and you'd likely dead before you hit the deck.

People have survived serious damage to the temporal lobe, which is more or less behind your ear. That is the area of the brain which manages memory and language comprehension. Survive a gunshot (or any serious injury) to the temporal lobe and you become not quite a vegetable.

Gun shots to the heart are nearly always fatal, but death is not instantaneous. Your blood pressure will quickly drop, but it could take 10 to 15 seconds to lose brain function due to lack of oxygen. A lot of things can happen in those seconds: you might fall to the ground contemplate your demise, or you might be pissed off and pull your own gun and shoot your assailant before you die. There are numerous cases on the battlefield of men shot in the heart who still had time to shoot back or throw a hand grenade.

[BeMuse]

Yes. The mortality rate of gunshot wound to the heart is 24.5%. A lot can be fixed with surgery, and even when it's really bad a patient can be placed on ECMO to bypass their heart until such time as a Jarvik artificial heart can be implanted while the patient waits for a heart transplant. That said a gunshot wound to the head jas a 90% mortality rate. Some patients do survive, but brain trauma tends to leave you severely handicapped.

[BeMuse]

*has

[BeMuse]

Location, timing, and medical skill are obviously important.

[dustybiker]

There is a show called “I can’t believe I survived.” Look it up. You sound like you might like it. It is truly amazing what some people have lived through.

[ItsMaddy]

there's probably a one in a million chance of surviving

[Astarlessnightsky]

There are some conditions, caliber/distance/angle/clothes... but some people survive a head shot, someone even survived with a thick steel rod through his head.

Heart is more tricky, as there are also the lungs and arteries nearby, so if a bullet gets deflected there is much more damage, but still possible, at least for some time to survive.

Surviving both is highly unlikely, but possible.