Woman Survives Nail in Heart

K O U N T Z E, Texas, Oct. 18 -- Joy Wiggins was enjoying a day of home-improvement tasks last weekend when she suddenly felt a shooting pain in her heart. She realized she had accidentally shot herself directly in the heart.

Wiggins was trying to use a nail gun to secure a board at an awkward angle, with the nail gun pointing back toward herself — but when she tried to strike the board, she missed it and shot herself in the chest. When Wiggins realized what happened, she climbed down from her attic, where she had been working, and called for her husband. Then she fainted.

Wiggins' husband got her to Christus St. Elizabeth Hospital in nearby Beaumont, where her heart stopped beating and she went into full cardiac arrest.

Surgeons worked quickly to keep her alive with a rare procedure to relieve pressure caused by a blood clot.

Just four hours after the lifesaving surgery, Wiggins was awake and alert.

‘I Am So Blessed’

Wiggins say it's going to take awhile for her to realize just how close she came to losing it all.

"I knew I hurt myself but I had no knowledge that I had hurt myself quite so bad," Wiggins said. "I love the fact that I do have life and that I am so blessed."

Trauma surgeon Dr. Dar Kavouspour and heart surgeon Dr. Michael Oszczakiewicz both worked on Wiggins.

Kavouspour said Wiggins is truly lucky to be alive and without brain damage.

"These are cases that I might see maybe three to four times a year, whether it's a stab wound from a knife or a nail gun," Kavouspour said. "The majority of the patients, bythe time they arrive to the emergency room, they're already dead."