The New Orleans’ skyline.

University of Saskatchewan student Joel Molder’s visit to New Orleans for a neuroscience conference ended with him on the operating table after he was struck by a rogue driver and left for dead.

Neuroscience 2012, the mid-October conference that Molder and fellow U of S students and faculty attended, is the biggest forum for neuroscientists in the world.

Near the end of the conference, Molder and some friends spent their evening in the French Quarter of the city taking in some jazz and blues music at a club.

Molder split up from the group when they left the club early in the morning of Oct. 16 to check out the architecture in a warehouse district not far from their hotel.

A fast-moving vehicle struck Molder and sped off, leaving him for dead.

Molder sustained multiple fractures to his left femur, a compound fracture in his right arm, multiple fractures in his jaw, broke three bones around his left elbow and lost most of his teeth.

Luckily for Molder, a woman called 911 after she heard his calls for help.

A professor from the University of British Columbia who was also in town for the neuroscience conference happened to walk by and performed first aid on Molder until the paramedics arrived.

The professor saw that Molder was choking on his own blood and rolled him onto his side, a move that could have caused serious spinal damage.

“Even with the risk of spinal injury, it was better that he have a spinal injury and live than not live,” Molder’s father, Jeff, told the Leader-Post Dec. 1.

Molder was taken to the Interim LSU Public Hospital and immediately underwent eight hours of intensive testing and emergency surgery.

The woman had reported the accident as a fall after seeing the way that Molder was laying half on the sidewalk and half on the road. Paramedics realized his injuries were sustained from a vehicle when they arrived on scene.

The head trauma nurse at the hospital called Jeff and Nancy, Molder’s parents, that morning and got on the next plane to New Orleans.

In the next three weeks Molder underwent a total of 26 hours of surgery at the hospital in New Orleans and at the Regina General Hospital.

Molder has been doing daily physiotherapy exercises on the hospital bed that is set up at his family’s home. He’s also been attending physio treatments three times a week.

“I’ve broken a lot of bones, but I can walk and I will be normal at the end of it. I’m lucky I have no brain damage or any spinal problems,” Molder told the Leader-Post.

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Photo: joseph a/Flickr