Surgeons honored for saving road rage victim
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Andrew Paxton is alive today because two University Medical Center surgeons stopped to help him after the unarmed man was shot in the chest in an apparent road rage incident.
Friday the doctors were honored for their service and bravery. Tucson Police Assistant Chief Roberto Villaseñor presented the surgeons with certificates of appreciation for their "selfless rescue effort."
Dr. Orazio Amabile, UMC's chief resident in cardiothoracic surgery, said Paxton, 23, had about five minutes to live when he and Dr. M. Cristina Smith stopped to help him June 29.
"The first thing I saw was a dying man," Amabile said Friday. He said Paxton lay bleeding heavily on the front stoop of a house near the shooting. Paxton asked Amabile if he was going to die.
The doctor told him "no."
"He was ashen, with labored breathing. His situation (was) much graver than he thinks (it was). He barely had a blood pressure," Amabile said.
Smith, who is pregnant, was on a fast-food run for the tater tots she craved when she and Amabile recognized Paxton was in very critical condition.
They called for an ambulance and called UMC's emergency department, letting doctors know a critically wounded gunshot patient would be on his way.
Smith, director of intensive care service for cardiothoracic surgery at UMC, said she asked that an operating room and a medical team be prepared for major surgery.
Amabile rode in the ambulance with Paxton.
Both Amabile and Smith operated on Paxton.
Several lobes of his lungs were badly damaged, as was a major artery near his shoulder.
"Without the doctors there, it would have been a much different scenario," Villaseñor said as friends, colleagues, Paxton and his family looked on at the University of Arizona Cancer Center on the UMC campus.
"The actions of Dr. Amabile and Dr. Smith are a reflection of their commitment as physicians to preserve life. Their quick action, taken in the face of unknown danger and with risk to their own well-being, reflects many of the values of the Tucson Police Department," Villaseñor said.
Paxton was driving on East Grant Road when a man driving a silver or gray 1998 (or newer) Ford Explorer nearly sideswiped him, forcing him into oncoming traffic, he said.
As he swerved back into a proper lane, his vehicle got hooked onto the Explorer's trailer hitch.
As Paxton's car got free, the driver of the Explorer fired three shots at Paxton's vehicle as the two turned off Grant and drove down a side street.
One shot hit him just above the heart, the doctors said, shattering his breastbone and piercing his lungs. The bullet exited his back.
Paxton got out of his car and "took refuge" on the porch of a home, police said.
Amabile and Smith, who followed Paxton's car, gave immediate first aid and were set to bring him to the hospital in a police car when the ambulance arrived about five minutes later.
Paxton's mother, Candi Hosley, 42, said her only child, her "prince," is "back in his castle," continuing to recover and driving again.
"I'm really focusing on getting better at this point," Paxton said.
Police are still looking for the shooter.
I think that EXPLAINES the rest of the story...
When you are in a panic, you do what you can - thank God for the surgeons that he is alive and the "prince" of his castle - :)