Comedian and actor Bob Saget’s sudden and tragic death shook fans still recovering from the loss of Betty White. Saget reportedly died from a bleed on the brain. Original reports claimed that Saget ‘bumped his dead’ climbing into the bed of his hotel room. Experts now say that seems impossible.
Multiple news reports detailed a “blunt head trauma” that had caused multiple skull fractures and hemorrhaging near his brain. The New York Times’ Science section tweeted, “Far from a head bump that might have been shrugged off, the autopsy described an unmistakably serious set of injuries that would at the very least have probably left someone confused, brain experts said.”
CNN chief medical correspondent Dr. Sanjay Gupta — a neurosurgeon by trade — laid out the details of the report during a segment of “New Day,” saying, “I think what it reveals more than anything else is that this was not a sort of simple bump on the head.”
He went on to say that early reports — even after the cause of death was released earlier in the week — suggested the comedian had possibly bumped his head getting into bed and not realized that anything was wrong.
“When you read this autopsy report, that may still be the case, but it was a very significant blow to the head,” Gupta continued, pointing out that the skull fractures were extensive enough to stretch from the back of Saget’s head around to his right temporal bone – and that there were additional fractures on the front of his skull as well.
“In order to do that — when I first saw this, if I knew nothing else about what had happened, you would think that maybe this was someone who had fallen down the stairs and had several impacts to the head or been unrestrained in a car accident,” Gupta said. “I mean, it was that degree of force.”
“Whatever happened here, I mean we may never know the exact — like how he fell or what happened, but it was a significant blow that caused that, and likely the bleeding on top of the brain … sadly, led to him becoming unconscious and then dying,” he concluded.
Watch
CNN's Dr. Sanjay Gupta examines actor and comedian Bob Saget's autopsy report and says the report reveals what seems to be signs of a significant blow to the head https://t.co/ZExvcfXyTk pic.twitter.com/I0YLeARRW5
— CNN (@CNN) February 11, 2022
Emergency physician Dr. Megan Ranney also became concerned with Saget’s autopsy findings, tweeting, “This is not a ‘slip & fall’. This is not a minor concussion. This is MAJOR head trauma,” she tweeted. “My condolences to Saget’s friends & family. I hope that they get answers as to what really happened.”
Hi. ICYMI: This is not a "slip & fall". This is not a minor concussion. This is MAJOR head trauma.
My condolences to Saget's friends & family. I hope that they get answers as to what really happened. pic.twitter.com/DtrwEAN1xZ
— Megan Ranney MD MPH 🗽 (@meganranney) February 11, 2022
Saget was just starting to travel doing standup again when he passed in Orlando Florida. His last standup act was on Jan. 8 in Ponte Vedra Beach. He praised the audience in a tweet posted to his Twitter account: