Published Sunday, December 29, 2002
accident
Herald Staff Writer
Every day, Tony Nicoletto tends to the cows on his 300-acre Liberty Township dairy farm that has been in his family since 1944.
As he pours feed for the waiting rows of hungry mouths, a tiny barn cat races over to share the food. Nicoletto, 54, also stops to visit his young calves, which wear specially made jackets to protect them from the cold, and a newborn who arrived just three days before Christmas.
Although Nicoletto still manages to maintain his farm, he doesn't have the stamina he used to have. His son, Robbie, and three hired hands now help him.
Nicoletto still gets emotional when he speaks of the accident three years ago that robbed him of some of his strength and nearly cost him his life.
On Sept. 18, 1999, while he and Robbie were filling a silo, Nicoletto asked his son to get on the tractor and start it.
"The tractor had developed an oil leak," he said. Nicoletto crawled under the tractor to find the leak, when the machine started to roll.
He screamed for his son to stop the tractor, but it was too late. The tractor kept rolling over his body.
The last thing he remembers, Nicoletto said, was the familiar smell of his farm -- a combination of cow manure, warm sun and earth, among other things.
"There's a smell ... there's nothing quite like it," he said. "The last thing I could remember was that smell."
He also remembers his wife, Susan, asking him if he could feel his legs. He said he felt them dragging along the ground.
During the ambulance ride to United Community Hospital in Pine Township, Nicoletto said he thought he was sitting next to the driver.
"I remember crossing the railroad tracks," he said. "My wife said I was conscious in the emergency room."
Nicoletto said he was told that with an accident as serious as his, there is a one-hour window for treatment before the injuries become life-threatening.
Fortunately, a helicopter was waiting to take another patient. Emergency personnel decided instead to fly Nicoletto to UPMC Presbyterian Hospital in Pittsburgh.
"From the time of the accident until I arrived (in Pittsburgh) was about 50 minutes," he said.
Many factors contributed to his getting to the hospital so quickly, including the location of his farm near a highway, a neighbor who was an emergency services worker and the available helicopter.
Nicoletto suffered a crushed pelvis; tears in the tissue containing blood vessels leading to his intestine, in his diaphragm and in the outer section of his colon; and a disruption to his urethra. A blood clot that formed around his pelvis also broke free, causing internal bleeding.
The actions of the staff at the local hospital contributed to saving Nicoletto's life, said Dr. Brian Harbrecht, medical director of trauma services at UPMC Presbyterian and one of the surgeons who operated on Nicoletto.
"He was very sick when he got (to UCH), and they recognized a number of things to save his life," Harbrecht said. "They put in a breathing tube, and they provided him with fluids and blood."
Harbrecht said Nicoletto had two injuries -- a crushed pelvis and a torn diaphragm -- that could have easily taken his life if not attended to properly. He could have bled to death from the pelvic fracture, or could have died as a result of breathing problems from the torn diaphragm.
Nicoletto took two units of blood in the helicopter and an additional 28 units during his first night in the hospital.
"It was 2è weeks before they'd tell my wife if I'd live or die," he said in a shaky voice. "It was longer than that before they could tell if I would breathe on my own or walk again."
The events after the accident are blurred in Nicoletto's mind. He remembers a nurse asking if his wife had been in yet, and if she'd peeked under the sheet draped over his body as he lay artificially paralyzed in his hospital bed. She did, although she wasn't supposed to, he said.
"They weren't sure at the time how serious my injuries were," he said.
Soon after that, the hallucinations started.
He thought one of the nurses put him in the back of her truck and took him home to keep him in her garage. Another time he thought his room was in a little cubbyhole and he saw an Arab tent city beyond his bed. When he went for X-rays, he thought the technicians were wearing bathing suits and standing in water up to their knees. When his cousin came to visit him, he thought his room was surrounded by cardboard boxes.
Nicoletto said he wishes he could thank the people who took care of him.
"These people do wonderful work. I don't know how they do it day after day. To go there every day to work and see people almost beyond hope. I don't know what makes them continue. I couldn't do it. It's just unbelievable," he said.
"It's funny because I don't remember their faces," he continued. He said he remembers their hands and what their waists felt like, because he had to hold onto them when they moved him.
Nicoletto spent five weeks in the hospital and another two months in bed at home.
"I had to learn to eat again, talk, walk. It was like starting from scratch," he said. "Everything I did was a big victory."
He went to Thanksgiving dinner that year in a wheelchair. By Christmas, he was on crutches.
At first he went back to Pittsburgh every two weeks for a checkup. That dwindled to once a month, once every three months, and finally, twice a year.
Nicoletto said he believes he survived because, "I feel God had a plan for me."
"I'm here for a purpose," he said. "I don't know what that is yet, but I shouldn't be here and I am."
Earlier this month, Nicoletto returned to Pittsburgh to speak as a trauma survivor at a hospital Christmas party. He was one of those who "beat the odds."
"It's really a sad time for them," he said. "There are a lot of accidents, injuries. They wanted someone who lived to come back and talk to them."
Nicoletto has also done work with the Mercer County Cooperative Extension. He speaks about farm safety, drawing from his own experience.
"When people ask, I talk," he said. "I just want to make sure I can stop this from happening to other people."
Nicoletto said his accident was the result of "sheer stupidity and foolishness." He said most farm accidents fall into the same category.
He said if farm equipment is old or malfunctioning, the way his tractor was, it should be replaced, no matter what the cost.
"No dollar value can be placed on your life," he said. "If you don't want to spend money on a tractor, it could put you in the grave."
He also pointed out that his hospital bills almost matched the worth of his farm. Fortunately, his wife has health insurance.
"It doesn't take much to wipe out your whole farm," he said. "It doesn't make any difference what it costs getting (equipment) fixed, because it's not worth your life, and it's not worth what you spent your life building."