Nurse Saves Teen's Life After Highway Crash in Florida

Tiffany Droze was driving home to Georgia from Panama City Beach on April 12 when she spotted a distraught teenager on the side of Highway 231. What she found next would test every bit of her decade-long experience as a trauma and ICU nurse.

The teen's car had veered off the road near Compass Lake Drive and slammed into a tree. The front passenger was trapped inside with a tree branch pinned across his leg, blood gushing from what Droze immediately recognized as a severed artery.

Without hesitation, Droze climbed through the back seat and wedged herself sideways through the car's console. She yanked out a headrest, flipped it upside down, and pressed with both hands above the teen's groin to stop the bleeding. She held that position until first responders arrived.

Officials from the Florida Highway Patrol told local news that the teenager would have bled out before help arrived if Droze hadn't stopped. Her vascular nursing background gave her the exact knowledge needed to save his life in those critical minutes.

Three teenagers from the Atlanta metro area were in the vehicle that day. All three survived and are now recovering from their injuries.

Sunny's Take

The part that shook Droze wasn't the blood or the emergency itself. It was thinking about the timing afterward. "What if the drive through took five minutes longer?" she wondered. Being in exactly the right place at the right moment felt overwhelming once the adrenaline wore off.

Her decision to stop came down to something simple and human. "I hope to God that if something happened to me or to one of my kids, somebody would stop," she said. It's the kind of thinking that turns ordinary people into heroes.

Droze is grateful all three teens made it. She even joked that if the young man she saved wants to thank her properly, he could name his firstborn after her. "My name is spelled Tiffany with a Y," she added with a laugh.

The teens are alive today because one nurse refused to drive past someone in need.