Doctor had no idea how to perform life-saving surgery on a teen — until he received crucial guidance via friend's texts

In many instances, people find themselves at the right place and at the right time. It may sound trivial at that point, but such a thing can even go as far as saving a person's life. A similar thing happened in 2008 when a British surgeon volunteering in the Democratic Republic of the Congo came across a teenager whose arm had been ripped off, as reported by BBC News. The vascular surgeon named David Nott knew he would have to perform a complicated surgery to amputate the boy's arm to save his life. However, only a handful of surgeons in the United Kingdom know how to perform that procedure. Thankfully, he happened to know one of those.

Nott was doing 24-hour shifts alongside medical charity Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) in Rutshuru when the incident happened. The surgeon used to volunteer with MSF for a month every year at that time. He found out that a 16-year-old boy's left arm had been ripped off. It was infected and was turning gangrenous. "He was dying. He had about two or three days to live when I saw him," Nott recounted. It was unknown how the incident happened, but it was pointed out that a hippopotamus had bitten the boy while he was fishing, or he had been caught in a crossfire between the government and the rebel forces.

There were just 6 inches of the boy's arm remaining and most of the surrounding muscles had died. There wasn't enough skin to fold over the wound either. The doctor had realized that he would have to perform a forequarter amputation that involved removing the shoulder blade and the collarbone. But unfortunately, the then 52-year-old had never performed such a procedure before. Later, he texted a friend, Professor Meirion Thomas from the UK, who had performed such a procedure before. "I texted him and he texted back step-by-step instructions on how to do it." Nott continued, "Even then, I had to think long and hard about whether it was right to leave a young boy with only one arm in the middle of this fighting. But in the end, he would have died without it, so I took a deep breath and followed the instructions to the letter."

Nott knew what his friend meant because they had operated together many times. The complex procedure was usually performed only 10 times a year in the UK, mostly on cancer patients. It required the backing of an intensive care unit and a good supply of blood, as patients might lose a lot of blood during the surgery. But the doctor had only a pint of blood and an elementary operating theatre. Nonetheless, he successfully managed to conduct the operation with the available resources. The teenager also made a full recovery after undergoing the procedure. "I don't think there's more than two or three surgeons in the UK who can do this. It was just luck that I was there and could do it," Nott expressed. 

"I don't think that someone who wasn't a vascular surgeon would have been able to deal with the large blood vessels involved. That is why I volunteer so often, I love being able to save someone's life." Nott also looked after the boy's wounds by being at his bedside in the absence of intensive care facilities. "It was touch and go whether he would make it, so when I saw his face on the MSF website afterwards, it was a real delight." About his colleague's text with the instructions, the doctor told CNN, "I felt I had like my guardian angel on my left shoulder showing me what to do. I just got on with it and everything he told me. I just did it." Thomas added, "All I did was tell David the 10 steps and I knew that he would follow them."