“I had a cough one day and the next day I’m fighting for my life and I didn’t even already know it.”
— Ronny Pruitt
LAKE BUTLER — As Union County Higher School’s football coach and athletic director, Ronny Pruitt knows plenty concerning strong battles on the field.
But because March 24, in a hospital in Nassau, The Bahamas, Pruitt suffered the toughest battle of his life.
“It makes you understand that tomorrow is not a guarantee,” he said.
Seventy pounds lighter and spending 33 days in an induced coma, Pruitt plans to be there once football practices open Aug. 1, on the sidelines once the season starts Aug. 28 versus Hamilton County, and along with the group July 15 once it goes to FCA camp in DeLand.
“The Lord has actually offered me the strength to get hold of me through just what I have actually gone through, and that’s not going to stop,” he said. “I simply have actually to listen to my physique and be smart.”
A few days prior to a spring break family journey to The Bahamas, Pruitt, 49, said his throat was hurting a little bit and he had a slight cough. He knew the flu bug had been going around. His wife, Robin, had simply battled through it herself a week earlier.
Pruitt’s group doctor called in a Z-Pak for your man and the family earned the trip, arriving March 19.
“once he got there, me and the youngsters had no clue it was this serious,” Robin Pruitt said. “He simply went downhill truly fast.
“I had the flu the week before. We believed he had precisely just what I had. We were doing our thing in the pool. He didn’t feel love joining us. We weren’t truly that concerned until that Wednesday night (March 23) once he told me he was having complications breathing. I knew after that something was bad.”
With the recommendations of a local resident that the Pruitts knew from previous trips, Ronny was taken to the private hospital in Nassau on the morning of March 24. Initially he was offered oxygen since his saturation degree was below 70, after that put on a ventilator.
Because he was still having trouble breathing, the hospital put Pruitt on the ECMO machine, a machine that provides cardiac and respiratory support to those whose heart and lungs are unable to give an adequate quantity of gas exchange to sustain life.
Pruitt remembers arriving at the hospital in Nassau, strolling in to the hospital and sitting on a gurney table. He doesn’t remember anything else concerning The Bahamas.
“That (ECMO machine) is something that is done surgically as well,” Robin Pruitt said. “A cardiologist has actually to do it. They didn’t believe he was going to make it in the next 24 hours.
“They believed he had pneumonia, that is just what they told us. I called my brother John, that lives in Gainesville, and he called some doctors he knew at Shands.”
By March 26, Shands came in to Nassau and put Pruitt on a jet, still on the ECO machine, flying your man spine to Gainesville along with Dr. Hassan Alnuaimat taking care of your man en route.
“On Friday evening (March 25), the doctors at Shands conferred along with the doctors in The Bahamas and they told them they believed it was H1N1 (influenza) as opposed to a pneumonia thing,” Robin Pruitt said. “They brought your man spine to Shands and at that point (March 26) they told us he was the sickest patient they had there for weeks. They couldn’t provide us a whole lot of chance since he was very, pretty ill.”
Pruitt started creating blood clots in his legs, along with his right leg particularly swelling up rapidly as a result of the influenza and the ECMO machine, which according to Dr. Stephen Smith of Shands is a common occurrence.
“The choices were to cut it open to relieve the stress or amputate it,” Pruitt said. “There were some clots in my left leg Yet they were small. They were able to maintain blood clots from going to my lungs and my brain.”
After a few weeks of showing some improvement, Robin Pruitt said her husband’s condition starting getting worse. along with his organs already shutting down, Ronny Pruitt started getting Acute Respiratory Distress Syndrome.
“Your physique starts shutting down since you are so sick,” Robin Pruitt said. “His heart was good, thank God, through it all. It was strong. His liver, kidneys, lungs, every little thing else weren’t.
“They said if he had been a smoker or drinker, he would certainly have actually never ever earned it. Ronny weighed close to 300 pounds at the time, Yet in this case it was good. They said since he was a little obese it helped your man survive since he lost 70 pounds.”
With his condition continuing to deteriorate, a doctor at Shands told Robin Pruitt to call in the family since he could not make it through the night.
“every one of our family is there, and I looked about and saw this various other doctor standing outside the room,” she said. “It was so surreal. He was simply standing out there, Yet I knew he was a doctor. So I went out there and of road I was pretty emotional.
“I told him, ‘My husband, they don’t believe he is going to make it through the night, Yet he is truly strong. He is a fighter. Please do something for him.’ ”
That doctor — Martin Rosenthal — did do something. Within a few hours Pruitt was put in a RotoProne bed, which pads in a unclothed patient every one of the means about and turns over.
“just what they chance it does is motivate your organs to start working again,” Robin Pruitt said. “He did points to maintain your man alive that night. He said, “our last chance is this bed, we haven’t used it lots of times. It might or might not work, Yet it can’t hurt.’ “
After 6 days on that RotoProne bed, Pruitt showed some improvement. Dr. Janeen Jordan additionally helped a lot, Robin Pruitt said.
“Those two doctors stand out in my mind,” she said. “I don’t believe he would certainly have actually earned it devoid of them.
“There were a great deal of wonderful doctors at Shands. It was simply a miracle.”
On April 25, the very first day of spring football practices, Pruitt woke up after 33 days in an induced coma. And even though he couldn’t talk, he pointed at the date in the room, understanding the significance of it.
But waking up was much more so.
“once I woke up, I believed maybe I had been in a auto wreck,” Ronny Pruitt said. “I didn’t know.
“It took me a little bit, love three days, I couldn’t talk. My daughter brought me a dry eraser board. I could hardly write. My handwriting was so bad, Yet they (his family) would certainly figure it out.
“I had a great deal of people praying for me. I had people I didn’t even already know from Arkansas, Virginia and Texas through connections through Facebook or our church. My dad has actually friends, that told others. Coaches from universities, love Florida, Liberty, FAMU, a great deal of coaches I have actually dealt along with came in.”
Smith, an acute care surgeon and emergency trauma, was one of 50 physicians at Shands that cared for Pruitt, along along with several nurses.
“He truly had excellent care at every one of levels,” Smith said of Pruitt. “Despite that his opportunities of dying from this were actually fairly high. This was a group approach. He is fortunate to survive.
“He is concerning as sick as you can easily be and still survive.”
Pruitt, showing considerable improvement, started rehabilitation at Shands on might 30 and returned house June 13. The adhering to day, was the Pruitts’ anniversary, and the day after that (June 15) was Robin’s birthday.
“It was the very best anniversary and birthday present I could have,” she said. “The doctors at Shands believe I probably gave it to him. It affects people differently. I got a flu shot, he didn’t. a great deal of people get hold of it that are not as sick as he was.
“I already know exactly how sick he was. He only knows by us telling him.”
While Pruitt went through a bodily battle that he is still working through — right leg still swollen from cuts earned in reducing blood clots — Robin went through an emotional rollercoaster. At two different hospitals she was told exactly how her husband most likely wasn’t going to make it.
And yet he pulled through, and plans to coach his Tigers in 2016.
“If you never ever gain yet another game or a state championship, I believe God kept you here to tell your youngsters just what God can easily do,” Robin tells her husband. “And just what a miracle he did in saving you. I am not a deeply religious person. I believe in God totally. I am not in church every Sunday.
“I totally believe God saved Ronny so he could provide his testimony to these kids. a great deal of youngsters here have to hear those type of things. I totally believe he kept your man here to do that. any type of of these doctors will certainly tell you, there is no various other demand that Ronny is alive. They never ever truly believed he would certainly walk from there.”
Pruitt credits his coaches along with sustaining Union County sports operating smoothly. He said surviving his disease has actually changed him.
The youth in Lake Butler are happy to see their coach spine on his feet.
“Family is the biggest thing for me,” Pruitt said. “Football-wise, I still have actually that same passion, Yet seeing several of the youngsters and several of the texts, I understand why I got in to coaching is as a result of the kids.
“I have actually to be a smarter person. I can easily walk. My stamina is not just what it was, Yet it is enough to do just what I have to do as a coach on Friday nights. It will certainly only get hold of better. I have actually come so far.”
— Contact Larry Savage at 352-374-5050 or larry.savage@gvillesun.com. And follow at Twitter.com/sunpreps
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