Engineering Wildcat Back on His Feet With Mentor’s Help
After a severe vehicle crash, biomedical engineer Ian Jackson has found his footing with a new outlook on life and the medical industry.
After a severe crash, UArizona Engineering alumnus Ian Jackson faced a foot amputation. His mentor, professor and orthopaedic surgeon Dr. Daniel Latt, was able to reconstruct Jackson's foot. (Photo: Kris Hanning / UAHS Biocommunications)
Ian Jackson was riding his motorcycle from the University of Arizona campus to his apartment a few blocks away when a car ran a stop sign and plowed into him, dragging him 40 feet down the road. His left leg was trapped for several minutes before a group of nearby students lifted the car off him. It was Oct. 19, 2018, just four days after his 22nd birthday.
Paramedics rushed Jackson, then a biomedical engineering senior, to the Banner – University Medical Center Tucson trauma program. There, doctors uncovered one injury after another: a broken femur, tibia and fibula; unstable fractures of several vertebrae; and a mangled left foot with multiple broken bones and missing skin. Jackson was rushed to the operating room, where he underwent a spinal fusion, had rods placed in his thigh and his leg, and had pins put in place to hold his foot together. His surgery lasted 10 hours.