Lithuanian whitewater rafter, Valdas Bieliauskas, was retrieved from freezing water by Jorian and his team. The clinical team performed an operation to amputate Valdas’s leg underwater, allowing him to be freed and ultimately saving his life. Throughout the rescue, Jo was instrumental in guiding the team with professionalism, courage and remarkable calmness under pressure.
00:00The wilderness is such an amazing place for people to enjoy, to families to enjoy.
00:07It's an amazing place for children to learn some really valuable life experiences.
00:11But at the same place, it does have its dangers and people need to be very cognisive of those,
00:17appreciate the environment but also appreciate the dangers that are inherent in it.
00:21Look, first and foremost, I'm an emergency specialist.
00:25But I've been really fortunate in my career that I've been able to take that sideways number of directions.
00:30And for the last almost 10 years, I've been working with Amulets Tasmania as a retrieval specialist.
00:39I'm passionate about disaster medicine, I'm passionate about military medicine, wilderness medicine.
00:46And of course, you never know what's going to happen on the day.
00:48You never know when you turn up to work whether it's going to be a day of checking equipment
00:52or whether it's going to be a day where something unexpected happens.
00:57That day on the Franklin River was certainly, I think, one of the most challenging, most complicated,
01:03I think most rewarding days of my career.
01:06I was actually packing with my family to go kayaking and got a call from my boss saying,
01:12you know, there was this awful situation of a Lithuanian rafter who was trapped in the Franklin River.
01:18His knee was trapped between two massive boulders and the team had been there all night trying to extricate his leg with a variety of mechanical devices.
01:29And we had to plan to try and amputate his leg because at this stage that was the only option left.
01:35And given the length of time he was in the river, it seemed very likely that he was going to be extremely hypothermic
01:40and there was a grave risk of him being a cardiac arrest after we got him out.
01:45And of course, to our horror, as soon as we did get found as free, kind of as expected, his heart rapidly slowed and then stopped.
01:53It seemed so unlikely that he was going to survive.
01:55But we also knew that he was profoundly hypothermic and bizarrely that's protective.
02:00We started CPR and we started the infusions and ventilation that is required to keep somebody alive.
02:05Because the next challenge was trying to get him from that rock in the middle of nowhere back to the hospital.
02:10But it all actually went pretty smoothly.
02:12I think due in part to all the preparation that had gone into planning for that.
02:16It's a team event.
02:17It's only possible through the incredible work of a very large number of people,
02:23sort of pilots and engineers and crew and paramedics, police, doctors.
02:28Everyone works together.
02:29They put their own ego to one side.
02:31They put the patient's needs first.
02:33And when you have all of those aspects, then some pretty incredible things can be achieved.
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