A doctor who stopped to help a driver after a serious crash off Lake Shore Drive during rush hour Monday is hoping to find the nurse who stopped before him and may have saved the young man’s life.
Jeff Linder was biking to work Monday morning when the doctor said he saw a car crash along the bike path down an embankment off Lake Shore Drive.
Chicago police said the man’s car went over an embankment after 8 a.m. in the 2700 block of northbound Lake Shore Drive, hitting a tree as it barreled toward Lake Michigan.
“The fact that he didn’t hit a jogger or someone on their bicycle is like a minor miracle,” Linder said.
Linder, who was headed to his job as chief of geriatrics and internal medicine at Northwestern Memorial Hospital, turned around to help the driver, who he said appeared to have a head injury following the crash.
“[He was] head down on the concrete with a bad injury to back of the head,” Linder said. “I’d guess a bad skull fracture.”
But before Linder could render aid, a nurse with Loyola University Medical Center, who was returning from a night shift, had already stopped and was caring for the driver.
“He did most of it,” Linder said. “He had already gotten a rag or a cloth to sort of put pressure on the bleeding to the back of the victim’s head.”
Thank you to the nurse from @LoyolaHealth who -- returning from a night shift -- stopped his car (that was almost hit), came down the embankment, and helped the driver who had what looked to be a bad posterior skull fracture until EMTs arrived. pic.twitter.com/Q0JXy58Wdh
— Jeff Linder (@jeffreylinder) June 10, 2019
The 26-year-old driver was transported in critical condition to Illinois Masonic Medical Center. Further information on the cause of the crash remained unclear.
Linder said he didn’t catch the nurse’s name, but hopes a photo taken from the scene might help find him.
Linder tweeted the image thanking the nurse.
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"Thank you to the nurse from @LoyolaHealth who -- returning from a night shift -- stopped his car (that was almost hit), came down the embankment, and helped the driver who had what looked to be a bad posterior skull fracture until EMTs arrived," he wrote.
The photo shows the nurse speaking to a police officer wearing all black.
“I hope we can figure out who he was and give him the credit he deserves,” Linder said.
