“FMC Owerri emergency response of Surgeons on call saved a Life at around 10:30pm yesterday.
This is a 35 year – old bricklayer who accidentally fell off from a storey building while at work and landed with the left lateral anterior neck, on a hammer standing on the ground with the handle facing upwards. This pierced via the anterior and exited on the posterior. However, as God may have it, he was not in any respiratory distress and vitals are relatively stable on presentation.
Being the Senior Registrar on call in Ear, Nose and Throat and Head and Neck Surgeon, I called out my 2 ENT Consultants, quickly raised alarm and invited the Vascular Surgeons, Burns and plastic, Traumatologist / Spine Surgeons, Anaesthetist, & Theatre Peri-op Nurses informed to get set..!!
Necessary urgent Investigations were done, thanks to our Med. Laboratory Scientist Friends, who acted promptly as the urgency demands, gave us 4 units of screened / cross matched blood and provided the results needed as fast as possible.
Within a short while, all the invited Surgeons stormed the Casualty, we quickly wheeled the patient to the theatre and Neck Exploration with foreign body removal was done.
Miraculous intra-Op Findings: The hammer neatly passed medial to the Carotid vessel and IJV and lateral to the Oesophagus, Trachea and the Vertebral column.
Patient was later transferred to the ICU by the Anaesthetist for observation.
Early this morning when checked, Patient is doing very well, vitals are still stable.
•Dr. Ibekwe Nnaemeka
(SR ENT, Federal Medical Centre, Owerri Reporting)
