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Earlier this year, 16-year-old Sammy Berko from Missouri City, Texas, was rock climbing with friends when he went into cardiac arrest. For two hours, staff at the climbing facility, then paramedics, followed by doctors performed CPR on the teen before finally giving up and telling his parents that he was gone. But as his parents said their goodbyes over his lifeless body, five minutes after he was declared dead, he started moving.
Nurses and doctors were amazed that Sammy seemingly came back to life and even more miraculously, he didn’t suffer any brain injury, which is common for patients who undergo prolonged CPR. When Sammy finally regained consciousness in the ICU, he had some short term memory loss, but no detectable permanent brain damage.
Sammy is far from alright. He lost use of his legs from them being deprived of oxygen for such a lengthy time and has a long road to be fully recovered. But his family knows how lucky they are and the teen has already made incredible progress. “I've noticed that I'm better every day,” he says. “I'm doing something new every single day.”