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Indian-origin doctor turns saviour
Vivek Shah, a Boston doctor of Indian origin, had just finished the marathon when the explosions tore through the air. He doubled right back to help the injured.
Vivek Shah, a Boston doctor of Indian origin, had just finished the marathon when the explosions tore through the air. He doubled right back to help the injured.
“I’ve never obviously been in combat, but people I’ve trained with have been and this is as close as I can imagine it would be,” Shah told ABC News Radio.
“In all my medical training, I have not seen things that I saw,” said Dr Shah, an orthopedic surgeon at New England Baptist Hospital in Roxbury Crossing, Mass.
“Everything I saw was a traumatic amputation, basically.”
Shah was among many Boston doctors who were among the runners, but quickly switched back to their skills as doctors to help those hit or injured by the explosions.
Most of them were those cheering on their mothers, fathers, friends and relatives running in the iconic marathon that attracts people from all over the world.
Quick medical attention played an instrumental role in keeping down the casualties, medical experts have said. And doctor-runners such as Shah helped.
A doctor from Massachusetts General, which was treating most of the gravely injured, who was in the marathon also pulled out to help the injured on the sidewalks, the hospital said.
