Interview with Alison Delgado

MATT LAUER, co-host:

We're back now at 8:10 with the call to action for an emergency physician that soon became anything but routine. That's because Dr. Tim Delgado discovered the critical patient he was working on was his wife. We'll speak with the Delgados in a moment, but first, TODAY national correspondent Amy Robach has their story. Amy:

AMY ROBACH reporting:

Matt, good morning. Twenty-eight-year-old newlywed Dr. Alison Delgado was a second-year pediatric resident, a marathon runner and in her free time an avid cyclist. But that charmed life took a tragic unexpected turn when a vehicle crashed into her while she was on her beloved bike.

It was a quiet October day at University Hospital Cincinnati when an emergency helicopter physician, Tim Delgado, got the call.

Dr. TIM DELGADO: And it just said a female cyclist in her 20s, a head injury patient.

ROBACH: When the flight crew arrived, she was in critical condition.

Dr. T. DELGADO: Quickly just looked at the patient's head and she had obvious jaw injuries and she had blood coming down her face.

ROBACH: Moments later, Dr. Delgado noticed the patient was wearing his team's cycling uniform.

Dr. T. DELGADO: And I was just like please don't let it be Ally. And I looked up and it was her. And I just--I just said, `That's my wife.' And everyone got silent.

ROBACH: After the initial shock, Dr. Delgado's flight nurse radioed for another crew to fly in and take over.

And then you had to wait for a second helicopter because technically you're not allowed to treat your wife.

Dr. T. DELGADO: It's not against the law, but technically I'm not supposed to treat my wife. At the same time, you know, one of the hardest things about this entire experience was kind of balancing the two competing roles of being both a husband and a physician.

ROBACH: Did you want to break the rules?

Dr. T. DELGADO: I did. I wanted to do everything possible to, you know, make sure that she had the best chance possible of survival. And so I was crying and I was holding her hand and I was saying, you know, `Hold on, babe,' you know, `you're going to be OK. Just hold on now, keep fighting.' And in-between that I would say, you know, we need to give her fentanyl and Versed.

ROBACH: With her husband's help, Alison Delgado made it through that first critical night, but she fell into a weeklong coma.

Alison, what was your first memory?

Dr. ALISON DELGADO: The first thing that I really remember was Tim being dressed up on Halloween like the Mad Hatter.

ROBACH: That's when Alison learned about the accident. She didn't remember, but she felt the pain. She had broken her clavicle, her jaw, her sternum, she had several fractures in her vertebrae, bruised lungs, a bruised heart and a head injury that was about to create her biggest scare yet; surgeons repaired an aneurysm in her brain, but two days after being sent home Alison had a seizure. Tim called 911 and once again while waiting for help had to step in.

Dr. T. DELGADO: I knew she needed the tracheotomy tube because her mouth was still wired shut from her surgery.

ROBACH: And she was struggling.

Dr. T. DELGADO: And she was throwing up. And she wasn't responsive to pain or doing anything. And I'd never put one in myself before, but I'd seen it done.

ROBACH: Five months later with this nightmare almost behind them, Alison rehabs at the gym seven days a week, exceeding all of her doctors' expectations.

Dr. ANDREW RINGER (Neurosurgeon, Mayfield Clinic): To be able to recover from that is nothing short of remarkable. Having said that, brain injury is a tricky, tricky thing and to be able to recover from that takes a long time and a lot of patience.

Dr. T. DELGADO: She really kind of redefined the rules of what is possible this soon after such an injury. So she's very close with her speech and I think it'll slowly and slowly get to where it's completely normal. If it's not, I don't care, she's close enough.

ROBACH: And Alison says she plans to be back at work next month and she also intends on running Cincinnati's Flying Pig Marathon in 2012. And, Matt, she won the first marathon she ever entered back in 2005, so I'm sure she'll do well.

LAUER: I was going to say nobody could doubt her, Amy. Thank you very much.

Tim and Alison Delgado, good morning to both of you.

Dr. A. DELGADO: Good morning.

Dr. T. DELGADO: Good morning, Matt.

LAUER: Alison, everybody says you have defied the odds so far, how are you feeling?

Dr. A. DELGADO: It's been tough, it's been tough not being able to go to work and going through the recovery process, but overall I've been feeling well. I don't question why this happened every day, I--it just happened and it's something I have to move forward on and try to get to normal as quick as possible.

LAUER: Tim, I...

Dr. A. DELGADO: And I'm looking forward to go back in to work.

LAUER: I'm sorry, I didn't mean to interrupt you. Tim, I was thinking back to Amy's piece there; when you got that first phone call and you hear you're about to respond to a female cyclist who's been in an accident, you know your wife is an avid cyclist, did it even cross your mind at that moment you might be responding to something wrong with your wife?

Dr. T. DELGADO: Not at all, Matt. You know, I thought she would be running that day and it just--it never even crossed my mind. I--it's something where, you know, you never think it could happen to someone that you know or love, and so it just--it wasn't even on the radar screen at all, just wasn't.

LAUER: Yeah. And you talk about when you got there you didn't immediately realize it was--it was Alison, and when you did realize it you said it was like being stabbed in the gut. Just for our viewers' information, this idea that technically you're not supposed to treat your spouse, what's the logic behind that?

Dr. T. DELGADO: Well, I mean, when I walked into that room I was a physician treating a patient and as soon as I saw, you know, Alison, I was, you know, I was no longer a physician, I was just a panic-stricken, you know, distraught husband. And, you know, the judgment in my thinking at that point was clouded because, you know, my--you know, I was worried Alison was, you know, critically injured and, you know, dying in front of me. And so you're, you know, more prone to errors and given the real possibility that Alison could have, you know, possibly died in the helicopter on the way there, you know, I would have been a liability to try and continue caring for her.

LAUER: But you do take part in saving her life that first time, and then five weeks later, two days after she goes home from the hospital, the seizure that she suffers and you're put in that position again and you say inserting that tracheotomy was the hardest thing you've ever done.

Dr. T. DELGADO: It was--it was horrible. I was alone, I mean, it was harder the second time than the first time. The first time we had other--another doctor there, we had nurses there, you know, and they could kind of step up where I couldn't and, you know, I felt like I was an island at home and I just felt out of control and, you know, I'd never put one in before and, you know, she just--she needed it and I knew that it was just me and I had--I had to do this. And it took me three tries before I actually kind of got up the courage to actually put it in.

LAUER: Right. You know, Alison, when I hear your story and the story of you two as a couple, that expression `what doesn't kill you makes you stronger' keeps popping into my head, both personally for you and I would say for your marriage as well, isn't that true?

Dr. A. DELGADO: Yeah. I think we became a lot stronger after this. I mean, we trust each other and we've always said that we're a team and we continue to be a team through this. And I always know that Tim will be here for me and I'll be there for him as well.

LAUER: Well, I know you celebrated your 28th birthday over the weekend, happy birthday belatedly.

Dr. A. DELGADO: Yeah.

LAUER: And our best on a continued recovery.

Dr. A. DELGADO: Thank you.

LAUER: We wish you all the best.

Dr. A. DELGADO: Thank you very much.

Dr. T. DELGADO: Thank you so much. Thank you.

LAUER: All right. Nice talking to both of you.