To revive someone after 30 minutes, you need to have a lot of faith.

There is nothing more precious than life itself. Each life is unique and irreplaceable. This profound belief is what drives physician Jamie Bigelow in her untiring motivation to help others.

22-year-old Monica was walking with her friends on the streets of downtown San Francisco, discussing plans for an upcoming Halloween party – when she suddenly passed out. She was rushed to the emergency ward of the San Francisco Memorial Hospital.

Jamie – a pulmonary, critical care and sleep physician – was called down to the ER to help with Monica’s admission. Monica had apparently suffered some sort of cardiac arrest. “She was lying in the stretcher,” recalls Jamie, “intubated, unconscious, with not much neurologic function except for the dilation and contraction of her eyeballs.” There was serious concern that this young college student was going to have significant brain injury. With every passing second, the chances of permanent brain damage increased exponentially.

Early on, Jamie had been taught that “time is brain” – meaning the faster a patient recovers, the lower the chances are that he or she will suffer permanent brain damage. Jamie needed to work quickly and precisely and do everything she could to save her patient.

Jamie’s team wrapped Monica’s body in cooling blankets to artificially induce hypothermia in hopes of slowing the onset of neural damage. During the 24 hours that Monica was in an artificial coma, Jamie checked on her patient often to see if she was responding. Generally, it takes 36 hours after the event to determine the prognosis of the patient.

The next morning when Jamie entered her patient’s room, she found Monica awake and smiling – with her parents at her bedside, shedding tears of joy and relief. Despite her a quick recovery, Monica had to be kept under observation for a couple of days. But quickly it became apparent that she had suffered no long term injuries and, a short time later, Monica was able to leave the hospital with a clean bill of health.

Over the years, Jamie Bigelow has helped thousands of patients. But she will never forget her experience with Monica – a constant reminder that in her line of work, losing faith is never an option.

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