The story

Nathan received a phone call on Saturday morning from a frantic woman regarding Sam (that's what they call my dad at work). This woman, Adriana Corea, a co-worker of my dad's at NBC, was so brave and acted fast. She shared an account of what happened to my dad before he entered the ER. This account was shared by her on facebook and I am pasting it below to give you more details surrounding our situation.

Thanks will never be enough for Adriana. Here is her story that she posted on Sunday.

THIS IS WHAT HAPPENED TO SAM @ NBC. Thanks for your concern.

Sun 9:00pm

I've told this story so many times within the last four days...and I don' t know if it's right for me to tell someone else's story, but so many of you have expressed concern and a desire to know what actually happened. So for those who have yet to find out, and to those who have at any point crossed paths along your careers with Dwight Samuelson better known to us as Sam...here's my account.

Sam worked the morning shows here at NBC as an editor for as long as I can remember. He retired not too long ago (and for those who are not aware), he returned as a daily hire on Saturday mornings, because he truly loves this profession.

Saturday at 5am I was the supervisor on duty for the morning shows. Sam was our editor, and Alex Zigic was the writer. Sam did not look well and when I expressed this to him, he agreed but he blamed it on the fact that he was not able to get a good-night sleep before his 3am shift. Being all too familiar with that symptom myself, I sympathized with him and told him to do what he could, and if he was not able to function, to let me know and I would step in and relieve him. Being the trooper that he is, he insisted he would be okay to work all the way through 9am.

At 830am, the writer noticed that Sam was not performing to his full potential (he thought that perhaps he was falling asleep due to his tiredness). He went looking for me and when we both returned to the edit suite, Sam was in the middle of a seizure like moment. He was not responsive, he was white as paper, and his body was limp. I immediately ran to alert the producer Laura Meeehan and had her call 911. When I returned to the edit suite, Sam was shaking, and kept wanting to stick his hand in his pant's front pocket. I reached in for him and found his cell phone. I thought perhaps he wanted me to call his wife so she would be able to tell me how I could make him better. Before I could say no more than my name, Sam let out an explosive amount of blood through his mouth and nose and then fainted. I could no longer hold him steady on the chair (I’m 5’1 and he’s like 6’2), and he fell to the ground. Those few minutes seemed like hours, I ran to the producer and yelled “where is the ambulance?” She assured me it was on the way and Anita Selvaggio (assignment desk editor) was outside waiting for them to arrive.

I returned to Sam’s side, turned him over and then suddenly he woke up, not knowing what had happened. All he wanted to do was get up and finish editing for the 9am show! I managed to get him to lie down and wait for the ambulance to come. All he kept saying was “I’m fine, I’m fine let me finish editing”. The ambulance came, and took him away. He was talking and seemed aware of it all.

Today Sunday I spoke to the Family at the hospital and they want to thank everyone for their concern with Sam. This is what they told me happened once Sam arrived at the hospital.

He underwent numerous tests, and it looked like they were going to keep him overnight, but things quickly turned bad. Doctors could not locate the bleeding ulcer, his stats dropped, he had several blood transfusions. They tried a very risky procedure, and with this they were able to locate the bleeding ulcer and stabilize it. Now they’re dealing with liquid in the lungs and other possible complications. They hooked him up to a machine to help him breath, and when I went to see him they told us that half of the breathing was his, and half was the machine so this was good news! He is totally sedated, but I'm sure he could hear me as I talked to him in his ear. They will keep him on the respirator, in hope that the liquid will dry up on its own. Let’s all pray for Sam’s lungs, his heart and for a full and healthy recovery.

Adriana