A HOOK attached to a bookcase went through five-year-old Zachariah Attard’s eyelid after a fall at Epalock Childcare Centre in St Albans in August, but he has childcare worker Chris Avery to thank for the gift of sight this Christmas.
Ms Avery received the Metropolitan Ambulance Service Community Hero Awards last week for her efforts, which paramedic Jon Hinton said contributed to a good outcome for young Zachariah.
The accident was a gory sight but Ms Avery overcame her personal distress and responded quickly, holding Zachariah still to prevent him from aggravating his injuries.
“It was extremely stressful. I’ve been teaching for 30 years and this is the first time I’ve had an ambulance arrive at the centre,” Ms Avery said.
“And you can imagine, you’ve got 30 children in the kinder and a child that is very distressed.
“I had to hold him onto the bookcase with the hook in his eye.
“I put my knees on his bottom and encouraged him not to move an inch while my co-worker rang the ambulance,” she said.
“I maintained a very professional calm on the surface but inside, my stomach was churning, We didn’t know how bad it was.
“Looking at it, when I was standing there supporting him, it was horrendous,” Ms Avery said.
“It was just really stressful because we all thought he was going to lose his eyesight.
“We thought it was in his eye ball and so did the ambulance people at the time. We were all expecting it to be the worst case because it just looked so horrific,” she said.
The paramedics were at the point of cutting the bookcase up to free Zachariah. But a morphine injection, which relaxed his muscles, enabled him to slip off the hook.
The hook had pierced Zachariah’s lower eyelid, narrowly missing his eyeball.
“They bandaged him up and took him off to the Children’s Hospital, and it wasn’t until later when they rang us and told us there was no permanent damage to the eye, which was fortunate.”
It was sigh of relief for everyone, she said.
Ms Avery said the award had come as a complete surprise.
“I got a commendation certificate in the mail from the ambulance, commending me for the event. I folded it away and later on, I was told that I was nominated for a community hero. I was a little bit amazed. And then a letter came saying I was awarded, I was truly amazed,” she said.
“I don’t think I did anything heroic, I just did whatever anyone would do,” Ms Avery added.
“You do those first-aid training courses every year … and when an emergency happens, it’s amazing how it all comes back and comes into place and you just respond,” she said.
“I was the one who was presented with the award but certainly, Sue Cross, my assistant was equally deserving. She was the one that rang the ambulance while I kept Zach calm.
“Everybody just worked together, which was really good,” she said.
It has taken months for the wound to heal but Zachariah’s vision is now crystal clear.
