Science Journalist Miles O’Brien Has Arm Amputated

Posted February 26, 2014 11:19 by Mark Quincy Adams

PBS science reporter Miles O’Brien suffered an accident while on assignment and had to have his left arm amputated at the elbow. The highly respected journalist seems to be taking it all in stride, chronicling the series of events while joking he is “typing this with one hand.”

According to his blog, O’Brien was securing cases filled with camera gear on a cart as he wrapped up a reporting trip to Japan and the Philippines. One of the cases fell onto his left forearm, he wrote, adding, “It hurt, but I wasn’t all ‘911’ about it.”

The arm was sore and swollen the next day but worsened on the next, Feb. 14, and he sought medical care. O’Brien did not detail where he was and PBS couldn’t immediately provide the information.

At the hospital, as his pain increased and arm numbness set in, a doctor recommended an emergency procedure to relive the pressure within the limb, O’Brien wrote.

“When I lost blood pressure during the surgery due to the complications of compartment syndrome, the doctor made a real-time call and amputated my arm just above the elbow,” O’Brien wrote.