A French doctor who nearly died after a 10-minute puncture hemorrhage while receiving unsterilized head injuries said Wednesday he was cured after receiving a new intervention from a British cardiologist.
Michael Rizk, who has since been declared “cured,” spent 11 days in a coma and lost his left leg and the use of one arm, suffered from kidney damage and is suffering from PTSD as a result of his near death experience, according to the BBC.
Rizk was traveling on a tour bus in Sweden and suffered a concussion when an improvised weapon had pierced his skull.
Prior to the attack, Rizk had a cavity filled by a midwife for a scheduled C-section. There, he went for a job interview after the birth of his second child.
At a dinner party, he was randomly told that he was the best “doctor in the whole world,” according to the BBC.
“I had a nice conversation and what I thought was going to be a friendly job interview got a funny vibe,” he said.
He was even offered a job as a physician at an Australian jail if he passed the interview.
He said he was suffering a small concussion and was treated for a severe headache.
He was then asked to go down on one knee as two middle-aged men tried to engage him in conversation. That’s when the incident occurred.
One man grabbed Rizk’s right arm and the other put his hands around his throat.
As Rizk recalled the attack, he felt faint and then violently convulsed.
“The next thing I knew I was bleeding from my ear drum,” he said.
A team of doctors responded within minutes, but time was running out.
The paramedics rushed Rizk to the nearest hospital, Sahlgrenska University Hospital in Gothenburg, and he was transferred to Stockholm, where a doctor performed surgery on his skull.
Emergency crews, including the volunteers who drove him to the hospital, flew to Germany after he called them and said he needed immediate help.
Doctors from both hospitals only needed half an hour to treat Rizk.
Eventually he regained consciousness and regained hearing in his left ear.
He said he is grateful for the NHS and UK Dr. Vivek Gupta, a member of the unit that treated him, and his volunteer ambulance crew for saving his life.
“Without their help and their search to find me they could not have found me,” he said. “Otherwise I don’t think that would have happened.”
Rizk celebrated the results of his surgery and said he is ready to go back to work.
“My department can’t wait to get me back,” he said.
Gupta told the BBC he believes Rizk is a true survivor.