Injured QB Matthew Donovan able to get outside, off ventilator

Oct. 27—LINCOLN, Neb. — Over the weekend, former Kasson-Mantorville multi-sport star Matthew Donovan spent 15 hours and then another 16 hours breathing on his own and off a ventilator, his father said in a recent Facebook post. The injured Mayville State quarterback, hospitalized on Sept. 19 and now receiving care at Madonna Rehabilitation Hospitals, was able to be wheeled outside after a church service at the facility. "After all these weeks, those are pretty special moments," Terry Donovan wrote. "On the way down, I asked if he was feeling OK, and he squeezed my hand. When I asked if he wanted to go to church, I got another squeeze. We had the same response when I asked about going outside. These responses are still early and inconsistent, but those little connections mean so much to us." Matthew remains in a minimally conscious state, his father wrote, but his son was able to respond to a nurse's instruction on Monday. "A nurse asked him to wipe some eye drops off his cheek," his father wrote. "He didn't quite reach his cheek, but he brought a tissue up to his chin. Today, a therapist asked him to grab a washcloth and wash his face. He grabbed it off his chest and moved it toward his face. He didn't get it all the way there, but he was responding to the instruction." Since arriving at Sanford Medical Center following a helmet-to-helmet hit during a football game, Donovan was placed in an induced coma. Terry Donovan wrote in his Sunday post about how the family was told how serious Matthew's injuries were and that recovery could take a long time. "When I think back to where this started, it's amazing to see how far he has come," his father wrote. "Five weeks ago, Matt was fighting for his life. He made it through that, and then he battled pneumonia and the complications that followed. Now, even compared with when he arrived at Madonna just a week ago, he is doing much more."