‘One Cannot Be Cold And Dead’: Here’s How This Boy Survived Near-Drowning After 1 Hour, 41 Minutes Of CPR
Gardell Martin experienced a 21-degree temperature drop in a harrowing, near-drowning experience. Doctors weigh in on exactly how he survived. (Photo: Rose Martin)
Randall Beachel pulled 22-month-old Gardell Martin from an icy creek on March 11 in Mifflinburg, Pennsylvania. The little boy’s brothers had lost track of him while playing, and he toppled into stream around 6 PM.
Martin’s body temperature had plummeted from a standard 98 degrees to just 77 degrees, he had no pulse and he appeared to be lifeless when his neighbor, Beachel, retrieved him.
“It was cold enough that my feet kind of instantly froze and I could not feel them,” Beachel said. “He was pretty much a lifeless baby.”
Martin was immediately given CPR, though, according to Buzzfeed News. He was rushed to one hospital, and then another by helicopter, where the CPR efforts continued for a total of an hour and 41 minutes.
Doctors warmed his body as they put the little boy on a ventilator and administered treatment. When Martin’s temperature hit 82 degrees, doctors registered a pulse. Not long after, his heart started to pump fully again. Around 2 AM the day after the incident — just after his dad, a truck driver, was able to be by his side for the first time — Martin woke up.
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About a week later, the toddler is back home with his family. He suffered broken ribs from the extensive CPR, and also has a slight tremor, according to The Patriot News, but otherwise, he appears to be functioning normally with no devastating ill-effects from the terrifying incident.
How could a toddler fall into 34-degree water, remain lifeless for close to two hours, and then survive without any apparent brain or organ damage?
The icy water that caused Martin’s problems also sustained him. According to doctors, the hypothermia Martin developed from the cold conditions while he was submerged in that creek likely saved his life. Low temperatures can have a protective effect on the body, where the metabolic and oxygen needs of the organs are less for survival.
At least since the 1980s, scientists have wondered what we can learn about organ preservation from true hibernatory animals, since some of them can “store” their organs for long periods of time at temperatures of around 40 degree Fahrenheit.
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Also interesting, in a 2009 study, researchers found that hypothermia among the severely injured is a risk factor for organ damage, but not mortality — so Martin’s case is still not typical, since he appears to have made a swift recovery.
No one knows exactly what happened, and why Martin is faring so well and functioning in a relatively healthy manner. “In my 23 years, I’ve not seen an hour and 41 minutes come back to this degree of neurologic recovery,” Dr. Frank Maffei, director of the pediatric intensive care unit at Geisinger’s Janet Weiss Children’s Hospital, told ABC News.
“It was an act of God,” said his mother, Rose Martin. “There is no doubt in my mind it’s a miracle. God had the right people in the right place at the right time and they all did a wonderful job.”
In near-drownings, youth is a protective factor, as historically, children under the age of five have seemingly had the best outcomes, according to emergency medicine physician Darria Long Gillespie, MD, an assistant professor at Emory University School of Medicine.
“Classically, cold water activates something called the ‘diving reflex’ in which the heart rate declines and blood is transferred to the more vital organs, accounting for improved survival,” Gillespie tells Yahoo Health, noting water temperature by no means guarantees survival.
“While it is true that hypothermia does reduce the body’s metabolic demands, which is why we do therapeutic hypothermia in other indications, it hasn’t been shown to improve outcomes in near-drownings.”
Gillespie agrees Martin’s case is rather miraculous. “Other factors associated with a poor prognosis that this child had included a resuscitation lasting more than 30 minutes, the fact that his submersion was so long, and the fact that he was unresponsive upon being found.”
So, how did Martin make it then? “I think that the biggest factors here were rapid and appropriate treatment, as well as continuing CPR until the child was warm and not giving up,” Gillespie says.
The rescue workers’ and doctors’ resolve is probably the major reason Martin is still here today. “There’s a saying that ‘One cannot be cold and dead’ — or, in other words, you don’t declare someone dead until they have been warmed and still show no signs of pulse or life,” Gillespie continues. “For this very reason, people can have no signs of life while extremely cold, and then, in some cases, have a return of circulation once they are warm.”
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