Because Life-saving Care Depends on Life-saving Equipment
Darryl Gurbach lay on a cold gravel road. He heard sirens in the distance before everything faded to black.
He remembers fragments: an ambulance ride, in and out of consciousness, a helicopter, arrival at Royal University Hospital (RUH) in Saskatoon.
“I was like, okay I have a fighting chance. If I’m going to make it, this will be it,” he recalls.
Gurbach arrived at RUH in April 2020, just weeks into the COVID-19 pandemic. His legs had been crushed by the heavy gate of a gravel truck on a rural road near Tisdale, and he’d waited hours before someone found him.
While the world had stopped all around the hospital, health-care teams were busier than ever. To survive, Gurbach focused on his wife and family. His daughter had just gotten engaged, and he thought about her upcoming wedding and the grandchildren he might have one day.
Gurbach endured the amputation of his left leg, kidney dialysis and more than a month in the Trauma ICU — his wife was only allowed to visit once, when his care team thought he wouldn’t make it.
“After that I started realizing that I’ve fought this hard already, I’ve got to keep going,” he says.
One of the people who helped Gurbach persevere was Dr. Elliott Pally, an orthopedic trauma surgeon (pictured on cover).
“People don’t automatically associate broken bones with a lifechanging event, but for most people going through it, it’s a major life event. Some people are forever changed,” says Pally.
Because RUH is the trauma centre for Central and Northern Saskatchewan, orthopedic trauma is one of the hospital’s busiest services.
“When it comes to emergent care, I don’t think there’s many places in the world that have better care than we do here in Saskatoon. People here can provide as good of care as anywhere in the world — if we have the equipment to facilitate that,” says Pally.
Pally and his team used every tool available to repair Gurbach’s pulverized right leg. He has had more than a dozen surgeries since his accident, but he has never given up. He recovered enough to walk his daughter down the aisle, returned to work five years later and most importantly, he can play with his grandchildren.
“Nobody is guaranteed the end of the day. And I found that out. If it wasn’t for the hospital, and the equipment that they have, I probably wouldn’t be here,” he says. “I just don’t know how you can’t support a place like that.”
Your gift to Royal University Hospital Foundation will help purchase new orthopedic trauma equipment — making care safer and more efficient for Saskatchewan patients.
“We have a big list of patients like Darryl. The faster we can help them, the better,” says Dr. Pally.
