Fourth-year medical student Kyle Staller was skiing down Cannon Mountain on Jan. 17 in the bitter cold when he came across a woman in trouble. Staller was wearing a helmet, which essentially placed the world on mute, so he could not hear the woman crying for help. But he could see that something was wrong.
Minutes earlier, Jami Vaughn—an experienced skier and middle school science teacher—had lost control and fallen. She was lying in an awkward pile with her limbs jumbled when Staller spotted her on the side of the trail. He stopped to see if she was all right. She was not all right.
“Somebody had already gone to get help, but I didn’t want to be by myself,” Vaughn recalled. “So I said, ‘Please don’t leave me,’ and he said, ‘I’m not going to leave you. I’m just going to take my skis off.’”
While his friend erected an X on the trail with skis to alert others of the accident, Staller introduced himself to Vaughn as a fourth-year medical student.
“I’m not a licensed physician, and some people might say that I know just enough to cause trouble in this type of situation, so I was nervous,” Staller said.
He completed an initial ABC—airway, breathing, circulation—assessment, asked Vaughn to wiggle her fingers, and posed a series of questions to find out if she was oriented. Her responses and ungainly position suggested a possible neck injury, which prompted Staller to stabilize her cervical spine. Kneeling below her on the slope, he placed his hands on her shoulders and cradled her head, shifting to his stomach when his arms grew tired. They lay in the snow and talked for half an hour or more, waiting for the ski patrol to arrive.
“She told me that she was a middle school teacher, and I remember saying that she was brave because that’s an age that I wouldn’t want to relive,” Staller recalled. In addition to chatting, Staller checked to see if Vaughn was warm enough and explained why it was important for her to hold still.
“He truly made me feel safe and cared for while we were waiting. I know he’s not a doctor yet, but he’s got the compassion skills down already,” Vaughn said. “Here the poor guy was trying to get some rest and relaxation and have fun, and he sort of just had an extension of his medical-school week on his Saturday.”
When the ski patrol finally arrived, Staller behaved as he would in a hospital with an attending physician, presenting relevant details about his “patient,” including her medical history. He helped the ski patrol team slide a backboard under Vaughn and load her onto a sled. He also followed them to the clinic at the base lodge. The last time he saw Vaughn, she was headed to Littleton Regional Hospital in an ambulance.
At the hospital, Vaughn learned that she had shattered her right humerus, torn her left rotator cuff, and shattered her left thumb while tearing the ligaments. The emergency room team had to cut seven layers of clothing from her body to make the assessment and treat her.
“I hold the record for having the most layers of clothes cut off in the Littleton emergency room,” joked Vaughn, who was referred to Bedford Ambulatory Surgical Center for further treatment.
While recovering from surgery at home in Manchester, N.H., she thought about Staller. She wanted to thank him, but did not know his last name. She did not even know what he looked like, because even though she had spent more than an hour and a half with him on the mountain, she had never seen his face due to their respective positions. She contacted the HMS Office of Communications and External Relations, and a staff member connected her with the student.
“I was surprised to get her e-mail,” Staller said. “In reality, I didn’t use much of my medical knowledge that day. I knew the limitations of my abilities as a healer, so I was able to avoid causing additional damage, and I tried to comfort her. In medical school, I think you realize that words can be very powerful in certain situations.”
“If his bedside manner is as good as his slopeside manner, his patients are going to be very lucky,” Vaughn concluded.
