Life under the ice and the miraculous rescue of Anna Bagenholm (7 photos)

On a Career in Medicine Anna Bagenholm (1970) – resident Sweden dreamed of since childhood. So when the girl worked as assistant surgeon for a year, then in the spring of 1999 I decided to celebrate this small anniversary by treating yourself to a trip to the mountains.





Anna with two friends - Marie Falkenberg and Thorvind Naesheim enjoyed riding, so she did not pay much attention to a small frozen river in the distance from their route.



Anna Bagenholm

The woman landed right in it, broke through the 20-centimeter crust ice and literally found herself in ice captivity. Friends tried pull Anna by her legs, but she got stuck more and more. Fortunately, below ice revealed a small air pocket, and the skier She breathed, trying to remain conscious until help arrived.



After 40 minutes of being in ice water, Anna, whom Marie and Thorvind was supported above the ice, went limp - lost consciousness due to wild cold. Arriving rescuers broke the ice and removed victim, and when she was loaded into a helicopter, she was not breathing, she was completely white, the pupils were dilated, there was no pulse. But the rescue team did not stop carrying out resuscitation measures, although there was a picture of clinical death.

Second birth



Rescue work at the scene

When the victim was taken to the hospital, body temperature was below 14 degrees. The patient was connected to the device cardiopulmonary bypass to warm her blood. A day later after the fall, the woman's heart began to beat on its own. And then started restore blood flow.

Anna opened her eyes two weeks later. There was still a long time ahead. way, because due to extreme hypothermia, the body turned out to be paralyzed. And for several months under the vigilant supervision of staff Bagenholm restored sensitivity. As a reminder of the accident left a small problem with the hands.



Heart-lung machine

But the most striking thing is that the brain did not suffer. Because of extremely low temperature, all processes in the body slowed down. That there is ice water that was supposed to kill, in a sense and saved the woman's life.



Anna not only fully recovered, but also continued work in medicine - got a job as a radiologist at Tromsø University Hospital, where she was brought back to life. After all, she survived after 80 minutes stay in ice water and 9 hours of clinical death and became for patients a real example of what is possible, if not everything, then almost All.