NEW YORK – “Project Runway” model Jia Santos – who was hit by a bus and dragged underneath it – is finally out of the hospital, with a puffy eye the only outward sign of her ordeal.
The 18-year-old beauty was released Wednesday night from St. Vincent’s Hospital Manhattan in Greenwich Village after a six-week stay that included extensive surgery for a fractured skull and right eye socket.
The horrific accident, which occurred as Santos was riding her bike to a taping of the Bravo program in mid-June, initially left her in critical condition.
Santos, born Eliza Jakubek in Hungary, had reached the final three on the reality show, where fashion designers compete for $100,000 and other prizes and their models for a spread in Elle magazine. The show went on without her, and her accident reportedly is explained in the finale.
Santos left the hospital wearing large sunglasses and accompanied by her boyfriend, artist Biagio Black, and two other friends.
“She’s still pretty tired from everything,” Black said Thursday. “She’s very happy to be out.”
“She seems to be healing well and we wish her the best of luck with her career,” said one of her doctors, general internist Daniel Sulmasy.
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