Iowa baby hit by softball has fractured skull, brain bleeds

ROCHESTER, Minn. – A 7-week-old baby is being treated for skull fractures and brain bleeds after she was hit in the head by a softball while watching her father play in northeastern Iowa.

Authorities say the overthrown softball struck McKenna Hovenga and her mom, Kassy, as they watched the game Wednesday in Shell Rock, some 95 miles (150 kilometres) northeast of Des Moines. McKenna’s father, Lee Hovenga, was in the game.

McKenna was taken to a local hospital then flown to St. Mary’s Hospital at the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minnesota.

A post on the Healing for McKenna Facebook page said that after 48 hours without a seizure, doctors have started to wean McKenna off her seizure medication. A neurologist told the family that McKenna’s brain activity is calming down.