Abby to the Rescue, Part 3
By Bill Stork, DVM
By obligation, and for the better of us all, time marches on. In the quarter century since, Jim Bury, Daniel "Red Bud" Cane and tens of others were not to be heard from, until September 2013.
Retired teacher Irene Renfro is not to be caught in bed when the sun comes up under any circumstances, regardless of the calendar and when dawn gets scheduled. Widowed for decades and retired from a life of education for years, her body is to stay in motion and she will take no chances with an idle mind.
While backing down her driveway, she caught a glimpse of the St. Louis Post Dispatch in her rearview. Rather than run it down, she tapped the brakes and rolled out of her car. Just short of 80, and operating on a couple artificial joints, spry this lady was not.
The driveway sloped just gently enough to flow water to the storm sewer and she had missed “P” on the shifter. As she bent to pick up the paper, the open door hit her in the hinder and funneled her under the car.
Like a scene from a horror movie, the front tire rolled up her pubic bone, rocked back down, and her pelvis became a parking block.
She screamed for help. Unfortunately, even a retired teacher can't generate a lot of decibels with a Nissan Versa resting on her chest. Fortunately, the time of day that Irene is prone to collecting her paper is when Abby the Westie insists on her morning constitutional.
On this day, Abby did not immediately return for her half cup of Fromm's. Rather than risk waking his neighbors, before calling her name, Wolfgram grabbed the Maglite and launched down the back stairs. He heard his Westie, polite by breed standards, barking like Tommy had fallen in the well.
Moving to the sound, he rounded the lilacs and found his elderly neighbor trapped under her car.
He pushed like a lineman on a blocking sled, relieving the pressure on her pelvis. Abby had managed to alert the neighbor, an ER nurse returning from shift, who supported Irene until the EMTs arrived minutes later.
The doctors and nurses at Alton Memorial provided excellent and immediate care. She was stable for the moment, on pain meds and fluids, but a two-ton economy car resting on an octogenarian is a concern. A collapsed lung and lacerated liver got Irene wheeled onto a med flight helicopter.
A stone's-throw over “Big Muddy” and just past Busch Memorial Stadium is Barnes-Jewish Medical Center, known regionally for exceptional patient care and renowned for some of the finest doctors in the world. After repeated imaging, Irene was found to have a fractured pelvis.
Though surgery was an option, Dr. James Bury judged that her recovery would be far quicker with excellent pain management, rest and support. Irene's pain was managed by one of the area’s finest, Dr. Daniel Cane.