Surgeon Operates on Teddy Bear For Young Patient
We Need More People Like This Surgeon Who "Operated" on His Young Patient's Teddy Bear
Patient asks if I can also fix teddy bear just before being put off to sleep... how could I say no? pic.twitter.com/WOKFc5zr91
— P. Daniel McNeely (@pdmcneely) September 30, 2018
Need a little something to restore your faith in humanity and provide a moment of relief from the oh-so-bleak news cycle? Then boy, do we have the perfect heartwarming story for you. A Canadian doctor is getting quite a bit of internet buzz for going above and beyond for one of his young patients — by operating on his teddy bear.
Dr. Daniel McNeely, a pediatric neurosurgeon based in Halifax, Nova Scotia, had to put his fuzz-mending skills to the test when 8-year-old Jackson McKie asked him to fix the torn underarm of his favourite stuffed animal, Little Baby. Jackson, who has a brain condition called hydrocephalus, was visiting the hospital to have a shunt repaired when he made the request before going into surgery. Of course, Dr. McNeely obliged, using stitches that were left over from Jackson's procedure to suture up Little Baby's severed arm, he explained to the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation. He also covered its face with a neonatal oxygen mask to "preserve the teddy bear's anonymity," he joked. Aww!
McNeely told the CBC that child patients typically bring stuffed animals into the operating room to help them feel more at ease, but Jackson's call for a spur-of-the-moment operation on his bear was a first. "How could I say no?" McNeely wrote on Twitter while sharing two photos of himself operating on the tiny brown toy. The neurosurgeon's tweet quickly went viral, garnering more than 23,000 "likes" and 10,000 retweets in just a few days, plus hundreds of replies from social media users whose hearts were melting at his adorable act of kindness. File this one under: stories to reread when you need a touching pick-me-up.
