Firefighters Give Blood Transfusion to Save 6yr old girl

I felt a terribly. I felt something that was circled.

I guess that might be the blood that I vomited.

Six year old Izzy remembers waking up at night swallowing and vomiting blood just six days after a tonsillectomy.

I pick her up and I bring her over here to the bathroom.

And I stand her in front of the sink just so she can spit up the blood or vomit or anything else. Right in front of the sink. So when I do that and I stand her there, she does this drunken sort of stuber, and she leans up against the wall and I immediately reach out and snatch her, grab her by the shoulder.

Izzy's dad, Palm Beach County Fire Rescue District Chief Neil Nemchik, immediately went into paramedic mode. Izzy's heart rate was fast. Her blood pressure dropped.

She was bleeding, and I was spitting out.

What's the emergency there?

She's bleeding out. She had a complectomy. She swallowed a bunch of blood. She spit it up to be a trauma. She's internal bleeding.

This is something serious for him. And it kind of hit me at that moment, the gravity of the situation for him and what it felt like for him to be holding his little baby.

That's his princess.

The family's security cameras captured our firefighter paramedics arriving right away. They started two IVs and oxygen, but little Izzy needed something more.

Seeing her little body there, not moving, not reacting to them putting IVs in her.

The EMS captain knew it was whole blood.

She was unresponsive and they have a low blood pressure. And I said, we're giving it absolutely. Let's get ready.

Firefighters worked together to carefully administer a unit of whole blood right there in the back of the rescue truck, right in front of the family home.

It worked. Within 30 seconds.

Her eyes opened up. She was alert.

She started opening her eyes and recognizing me. And just that moment of her looking at me for reassurance, I knew that she was going to be okay. I just, at that moment, I felt again that wave of peace that our family was going to be okay. This was going to be a scary situation. We're going to obviously have to go through some procedures at the hospital to have her checked and cleared. I knew that that whole blood made a difference for her.

EMS captain Ada Rayburn also knew.

It's incredible, you know, I mean, it's as a mother, as a grandmother, and as a person who loves their job, right? This is what we train for.

Palm Beach County Fire Rescue is the first fire rescue department in Palm beach county giving whole blood transfusions on scene.

I want people to learn specifically about this so we can save others. Not every agency can do this, right? Not every agency has the resources that we have to save lives.

And that's how much of a difference blood can make.

It be so funny if I just found that blood and then one day, and then I said, I feel better. That would be so hilarious.

But that's exactly what happened. The blood revived Izzy. Her throat started clotting, and she escaped, needing more invasive action at the hospital.

Here at Palm Beach County Fire Rescue, we are all about excellence today while improving tomorrow.