An Irish GP working in Australia has been awarded for coming to the aid of a colleague who was being attacked by an axe wielding patient.
Dr Fergus McCabe was recognised for acts of bravery by the Australian governor general, Sam Mostyn, after tackling the axe wielding attacker at his clinic in north Perth, Australia on 28 September, 2023. He was one of 22 people recognised for such efforts.
This happened after Dr McCabe was with a patient at the clinic, when he heard a scream from his colleague's consulting room underneath. He then ran downstairs where he faced this terrifying situation.
“It wasn’t a normal scream. It was a very shrill, distressing scream. So I immediately knew something was wrong", the Dublin native to Medical Republic. “I very quickly got up and left my room. As I was going down the stairs, my young receptionist had jumped up, and […] was going to help".
The GP also passed by a 12 year old boy with his father who were awaiting their appointment.
“I could see in his face, the absolute terror", Dr McCabe added.
The colleague in question, Dr Anna Chaney was being attacked by a former patient, Christopher Bernard Healey, who was armed with an axe. It turned out that Dr Chaney had taken a restraining order against Mr Healey years earlier for sending her inappropriate messages.
Dr McCabe also told ABC: “The receptionist in our upstairs reception area, who I think at the time was 18 or 19, was running down the stairs to help".
“The 12-year-old boy who was waiting to see me with his father, his father offered help".
It was at this point that the receptionist called emergency services, while all patients were evacuated from the premises.
Having initially walked into the wrong GP room while attempting to seek Dr Chaney, Mr Healey found the GP in a consultation with a woman, who was 12 weeks pregnant.
Ashleigh, who was the GP in the first room, ran to help Dr Chaney, after the culprit had slammed the door behind him to corner her, leaving him with no means of escape.
Dr McCabe said to ABC: “[Ashleigh] knew Anna and the patient were jammed, trapped in that room, and she had the absolute bravery to come back in, run past the door and swing the door open".
“Ash incredibly bravely swirled on her feet, ran back in, ran past the door and swung the door open and kept running past and then out the other exit, which meant that by the time I got down, the door was open and that made a huge difference".
He went on to mention the exact moment that he found himself face to face with Healey, who had struck Dr Chaney, and had wrestled with the pregnant woman.
“This patient had jumped up in between Anna and him and tried to grapple with him and grab the axe, which slowed him down and also distracted him,” Dr McCabe said. “I was able to grab the patient, pull her out, and then throw him across the room and get Anna behind me.”
He added: “Because the door was open, I just cleaned him out. I just ran in and took him completely by surprise".
Elsewhere, Dr McCabe admitted that he felt some discomfort as the attacker lay hurt on the floor, given his oath to treat the sick and injured.
“If you think about my childhood and why I chose to be a doctor, I didn’t like the part of me that thought I would have actually hit him,” he said.
“At that point I remember I actually made a conscious thought of going, ‘OK, what do I do now if he comes at her [Anna] again, or if he comes at me again?’ That’s the bit that stirs me a little bit because I think I want[ed] to hit him with the axe".
He stated that he did not want the award to be about him, and praised the team effort of the staff and patients in a difficult situation.
He said: “One of the reasons why I accepted the publicity that goes with this very humbling award was that I wanted to really stress was that it wasn’t just me, everybody reacted".
The police were later informed of the incident, with one of Dr McCabe's colleagues telling them that he was not the one who committed the offence and redirected them back to Mr Healey.
Thankfully, Dr Chaney recovered from her injuries after being hospitalised.
Mr Healey pleaded guilty to six charges, including attempted murder of Dr Chaney. He was sentenced to 23 years in prison.
