By O’Dell Isaac
The Gazette
COLORADO SPRINGS, Colo. — Chelsea Tuff was about a week from her due date the morning of Aug. 6, when she woke up and began experiencing contractions about five minutes apart. After meeting with a midwife a few hours later, it looked like her daughter would be born a week early.
“She had a heartbeat, she was moving,” said Tuff, who has two older children. “Everything was great.”
Then she began to bleed. The bleeding became profuse. Her partner, Korey Blankenship, called 911. When an ambulance arrived about seven minutes later, Tuff had lost roughly a liter of blood.
If not for a blood transfusion, administered while in the ambulance, Tuff and her baby may well have died, she said during a news conference on Tuesday.
“I remember being in the hospital and realizing, ‘I think (the transfusion) is what saved our lives,” she said. “That made all the difference.”
Tuff’s lifesaving transfusion was made possible by the city’s new pre-hospital whole blood program, a joint initiative launched by UCHealth and the Colorado Springs Fire Department on May 22.
“The most common reason for you to die in Colorado Springs, if you are under the age of 46, is hemorrhagic shock, or bleeding to death,” said Matt Angelidis , CSFD’s co-chief medical director and an emergency medicine physician at UCHealth.
“And we know, from our data and research, that about 40% of those patients could survive if they had a blood transfusion before arrival to the hospital.”
First responders have traditionally used intravenous fluids to treat bleeding patients until they can be transported to a hospital, where they receive blood. The new program allows emergency responders to give whole blood — which hasn’t had its red blood cells or plasma removed — in the field. That saves time, which, in turn, saves lives, Angelidis said.
Over the first 100 days of the program, 44 units of blood have been delivered to 38 patients suffering severe blood loss, officials said. Thirty-two of those patients survived.
“That’s about one patient every three days who would not be alive in our city if it weren’t for this program,” Angelidis said.
Making whole blood available for field transfusions is complicated and expensive, officials said. High-tech equipment is to properly store, transport, reheat and transfuse the blood. Responders need to be trained in the proper way to transport and administer the blood.
All these things cost money, and the program would not be possible without the $275,000 in philanthropic gifts from the UCHealth Memorial Foundation and members of the Colorado Springs community, Angelidis said. The funds will support the first three years of the program, which is on pace to save up to 100 lives in its first year.
On Aug. 6, when Tuff came dangerously close to bleeding out, medical technicians were replenishing her blood loss within 18 minutes of the 911 call, officials said. She was taken to UCHealth Memorial Hospital , where she underwent a successful emergency cesarean section.
Tuff would be fine and, more importantly to her, so would her daughter, whom she affectionately calls “Miss Rosie.”
“She was very mad to be brought into the world so abruptly,” Tuff said as she fought to hold back tears. “But she was so healthy.”
“Miss Rosie” is now two months old, with a ready smile, a healthy appetite, and a (mostly) calm demeanor, Tuff said. As her mother addressed about three dozen people at Tuesday’s news conference, Rosie slept, nestled in the crook of her father’s arm.
Angelidis stressed that an essential element of the new program is the blood itself, which comes from donations.
“If you’ve ever thought to yourself, ‘Should I give blood or not,’ I hope that today’s story … will inspire you to donate,” Angelidis said.
“This program is essential to our community, and it is making a difference,” said Colorado Springs Fire Chief Randy Royal .
“Each one of the people saved by this program has a family, friends, and others who were impacted by the life that was saved. This (case) was especially great, because two lives were saved.”
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