Surgeon mom honored for saving umpire's life at her son's Little League game
Dr. Jennifer LaFemina helped an umpire hit in the throat by a baseball.
One mom's attendance at her son's Little League game turned into a lifesaving measure.
Dr. Jennifer LaFemina, a surgical oncologist at UMass Memorial Health in Worcester, Massachusetts, was watching her son play in a local baseball tournament on July 11, when she saw the home plate umpire get hit in the throat by a wild pitch.
The pitch bounced on the ground and hit the umpire, identified as Korey Pontbriand, in the throat as he turned his head to avoid a hit to the face, according to Phil Davis, president of the Oxford Little League, whose team was playing against LaFemina's son in the tournament.
Pontbriand fell to his knee after the hit to catch his breath, but then continued to umpire the game in a different position.
Davis told "Good Morning America" that shortly after the incident, LaFemina and her surgical assistant, who was watching the game with her, examined Pontbriand and advised him to go to the hospital for treatment.
Pontbriand, who lost his voice after the hit, declined treatment and continued officiating, while LaFemina, on her own, continued to monitor him from the stands, according to Davis.
"[LaFemina] told me that she was going to be watching him to see how he was," Davis recalled. "She came and found me in the fifth inning and told me that it looked like he was struggling out there and getting worse, so we were able to get him off the field at that time."
Davis said that as they were making arrangements to take Pontbriand to a local hospital, he collapsed.
LaFemina, who declined to be interviewed for this article, immediately began performing CPR, with the help of her assistant, according to Davis.
"She then asked me to get the defibrillator," he said. "I got one from the fire station next door and by the time we got the defibrillator back, it would not deliver a shock because she had just revived him."
Once LaFemina was able to get a pulse on Pontbriand, he was transported to UMass Memorial Health, where he is improving but remains in the intensive care unit, according to Davis.
Davis said he believes Pontbriand, a Little League umpire for over 10 years, would not have survived had LaFemina and her assistant, Emily Lutfy, not been at the game that day.
"It was just fate that she was there that night," Davis said. "We’re all trained in a basic CPR class, but there is no doubt in my mind that if she was not present at that game, along with her assistant, that we would be telling a whole different story about how somebody lost their life at a Little League game."
In another twist of fate, while LaFemina was delivering lifesaving CPR, her son scored the winning run in the game. His team, the Algonquin All-Stars, also went on to win the tournament, according to Davis.
On Tuesday, LaFemina and Lufty, as well as Davis, were honored by the town of Oxford, where the game took place. The three each received a certificate of recognition for the "lifesaving medical care" they provided to Pontbriand.
When she accepted the honor, LaFemina had players from both the Algonquin All-Stars and Oxford Little League teams join her at the podium.
The mom of two shared a story about Pontbriand, noting that he had given her son, as well as other players, high-fives and encouraging words throughout the game, both before and after his injury.
"Our beloved umpire's actions reiterate that every day we get to make a choice," LaFemina said. "We have the choice to be kind and good, and to try to make the world a better place, and even the smallest things we do have the largest and most long-term impacts on all of those people around us. We just don't know at the time we're doing it."
She continued, "So this is our umpire's legacy, and I would like to thank him for the contribution to my son that night and to our entire Little League team that night ... and really we just can't wait to see him back again on the field."
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