{"id":12291,"date":"2018-09-04T16:45:19","date_gmt":"2018-09-04T16:45:19","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.tmc.edu\/news\/out-from-under-how-one-surgeon-survived-two-tragedies\/"},"modified":"2019-08-16T15:04:23","modified_gmt":"2019-08-16T15:04:23","slug":"out-from-under-how-one-surgeon-survived-two-tragedies","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.tmc.edu\/news\/2018\/09\/out-from-under-how-one-surgeon-survived-two-tragedies\/","title":{"rendered":"Out from Under: How one surgeon survived two tragedies"},"content":{"rendered":"
On Dec. 30, 2007, Eugene Alford, M.D., put on his Sunday best and prepared to head to church with his family. His brown hair was neatly coiffed and his thick mustache perfectly groomed, but for some reason, as he stood in his home in Houston\u2019s Montrose neighborhood, he couldn\u2019t quite shake a \u201cweird\u201d feeling.<\/p>\n
\u201cI had this real sense of foreboding that something really bad was going to happen,\u201d Alford said. \u201cIt was a feeling that I was going to lose a person or I was going to fall from grace.\u201d<\/p>\n
Alford, a facial plastic and reconstructive surgeon at Houston Methodist Hospital, decided to skip church and spend the day on his 86-acre farm in Bellville, 70 miles west of Houston. He hopped on his tractor, a 20th anniversary present from his wife, Mary, and started mowing the pasture. For Alford, ever the country boy, driving a tractor was the ultimate form of therapy.<\/p>\n
He wanted to create a deer blind and had mapped out some brush he needed to clear with his tractor, which was equipped with a frontend loader. As he plowed through the thicket, he spotted a dead white oak tree squarely in the middle of the clearing. He rolled up to it twice, each time backing away.<\/p>\n
\u201cFor some reason, on the third try, I thought, \u2018Quit being a chicken and do it!\u2019\u201d Alford recalled.<\/p>\n
Determined to remove the tree, Alford lifted the front-end loader of his tractor and accelerated toward it, hoping to jostle the dead oak into submission. But water had collected at the tree fork and rotted through the wood. As the tractor dug into the trunk, the 950-pound tree top snapped off and collapsed forward onto Alford, pinching him between the steering wheel and the tractor seat. His spine was crushed immediately.<\/p>\n
\u201cI knew I was paralyzed and I knew I was hurt,\u201d said Alford, who was 48 at the time.<\/p>\n
The tree knocked Alford\u2019s cell phone holster off his belt and onto the ground beneath the tractor, out of reach. His heart sank, but then he remembered what he had done before he climbed onto the tractor, something seemingly inconsequential that he had never done before: He had taken his phone off his belt and placed it in his shirt pocket.<\/p>\n
He reached for the phone and hit speed dial for Mary. She was in the kitchen at home in Houston, steeped in commotion. Two of their kids were preparing for their church\u2019s youth ski trip to Colorado the next day, and a gaggle of their daughter\u2019s high school friends was hanging out on the front porch. Still, when Mary heard the house phone chime, she picked up on the first ring.<\/p>\n
\u201cI was calling to say goodbye because I really thought I was going to die,\u201d Alford said.<\/p>\n
Through labored breathing, he managed to tell his wife what happened. In a panic, Mary handed the phone to their youngest son, Charles, who had just turned 15, with instructions to keep Gene on the line while she called for help on her cell phone. Charles kept his father talking, giving him the encouragement he needed to hang on just a little longer. Little did Alford know that 14 months later, he would be on the receiving end of a similar call in the face of another family tragedy.<\/p>\n
\u201cI couldn\u2019t let Gene stop talking. I knew enough to think, \u2018We have to keep him awake,\u2019\u201d Mary said.<\/p>\n
Alford was trapped in Austin County, and Mary was calling from Harris County. She dialed 911, but after learning she could not send help to another county, she frantically contacted friends who lived next door to their Bellville farm.<\/p>\n
They answered the phone right away, called 911 and rushed out of their house toward Alford\u2019s property.<\/p>\n
Meanwhile, the local sheriff overheard the volunteer fire department call go out for Alford\u2019s location. He recognized the address, set out on foot to find Alford pinned down in his tractor and immediately radioed Life Flight for help.<\/p>\n
In a rush of adrenaline, the sheriff and Alford\u2019s next-door neighbor managed to hoist the massive tree off Alford\u2019s body. Shortly thereafter, Life Flight arrived and airlifted the doctor to the Level 1 trauma center at Memorial Hermann-Texas Medical Center.<\/p>\n
\u2022 \u2022 \u2022<\/p>\n
After trauma doctors stabilized Alford, he was transferred to Houston Methodist to undergo surgery the following day, New Year\u2019s Eve.<\/p>\n
He suffered six broken ribs, a broken collarbone and a broken shoulder blade from the accident. Worse, the tree crushed nearly every thoracic vertebra in his spine and pinched the blood vessels that supply blood to his spinal cord. The injury paralyzed Alford from the waist down, but because his spinal cord wasn\u2019t fully severed, his condition is classified as an incomplete spinal cord injury, meaning he has some feeling and function in his legs, but cannot walk.<\/p>\n
Approximately 288,000 people in the United States are living with a spinal cord injury,<\/a> with 17,700 new cases occurring each year<\/a>, according to the National Spinal Cord Injury Statistical Center. Most of the injuries are caused by vehicular accidents, falls, acts of violence and sports and recreation activities.<\/p>\n Nearly 70 percent of all cases result in incomplete spinal cord injuries.<\/p>\n \u201cThe big cable that comes into your house and powers all your TVs [has] a million little wires,\u201d Mary explained. \u201cIf that\u2019s cut, you can\u2019t just attach it back altogether. You might [attach] some of them. You might get some audio. You might get some video. But there are too many little wires. That\u2019s sort of how Gene is.\u201d<\/p>\n Alford remained in Houston Methodist\u2019s intensive care unit under heavy sedation for a week and a half.<\/p>\n \u201cWe definitely worried about him dying during those 11 days, but I never worried about, \u2018Oh my goodness, how are we going to spend the rest of our lives like this?\u2019\u201d Mary said. \u201cWe just didn\u2019t allow ourselves to think that way.\u201d<\/p>\n